


Are You Tired of Me Yet?

by ChaoticMind (ChloeCasey), Chloe Casey (ChloeCasey)



Category: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series)
Genre: Alcohol, Cutesy date stuff, F/F, Helsa is a bitch but she’s a very sad bitch that needs a hug, Helsa/Niffty ship name is HelFire, Hopefully we convert at least one of you, Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M, Niffty is a ball of sunshine that will also break your kneecaps, Recreational Drug Use, The Von Eldritches are scary and also assholes, experimental fic, fire sharks, this is Very Crackshippy and we’re hoping y’all find it cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:54:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 40,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24597082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChloeCasey/pseuds/ChaoticMind, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChloeCasey/pseuds/Chloe%20Casey
Summary: Helsa Von Eldritch was one of the infamous and feared monsters in all of Hell, and for good reason. She was a beast unlike all of Hell, overpowered only by her very parents, and she often disregarded the other beings of Hell as nothing more than bugs to be crushed under her boot. However, one day she happens to meet one particular bug that proves to be rather... unexpected.
Relationships: Implied Alastor/Sir Pentious, Niffty/Helsa Von Eldritch
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	Are You Tired of Me Yet?

**Author's Note:**

> Heya, comin’ at ya with another fic for the Hazbin fandom! This time with a relationship we haven’t quite seen before: Helsa and Niffty! Tell us what you think in the comments, and don’t be shy about that kudos button ;)
> 
> Small disclaimer: this fic is a bit different than what we’re used to writing, so we’re considering this mildly experimental.
> 
> Title is inspired by the song “This is Home” by Cavetown. The song referenced later in the fic is “For Island Fires and Family” by Dermot Kennedy.

Rosie’s Emporium was probably one of Niffty’s favorite shopping spots in all of Hell, and for good reason. She often found that she had a lot of restless energy that couldn’t be worn off by cooking or cleaning or playing with flames, and when Alastor was busy or had no errands to have her run or no targets to hunt, she found that a good long jaunt through various malls and shopping centers was the best way to go about it. It was a good way to let herself go and relax and not be so strung up, and with money not exactly being an issue, she always left every plaza she visited with bags of new stuff hanging from her arms. Sure, there was the hassle of there being a lot of crowds of various demons (some bigger than others), but most went about giving her a wide berth in public spaces anyway, so it’s not like she had to worry too much about that aspect. Malls were huge spaces filled with lots of stores to browse through, with lots of shiny baubles and pretty clothes, and she couldn’t help but go her way zipping all around the Emporium in all of its glory, often accompanied with her phone and earbuds to listen to music all the while, or even a podcast, just to keep her mind from wandering, to keep herself grounded and focused.

She was currently perusing one of the fancier boutiques, named _The Ruby Dragon_ , and though she was able to find quite the lovely shade of red thread, she found that the actual quality of clothing was a bit more disappointing, and she found herself eyeing the “Rosie Brand Guarantee” stamp on the price tags in a more than dubious manner, glancing back up toward the fancy floral skirt hanging on a rack in front of her that she knew was probably going to be torn to shreds the moment it was put into a dryer, and grimaces, before letting the cloth drop. The music was still ringing away in her ears, a mix of quiet piano and electronic melodies, along with a bit of percussion that was making her hands tap against her arms as she folded them. Her eye flicks upwards as she sees another figure run their hand over a brown leather coat with a furred interior, and just a quick glance over it’s frame is enough to determine that this was absolutely _not_ Rose Brand Guarantee. She feels herself wince and suck in a breath, only to realize the person had shifted to glance at her, and she feels her cheeks idly flush at her mistake. She moves to pull an earbud out, idly pressing down on the buttons lining the side of it to turn down the volume, clearing her throat after a moment. “Oh, sorry. It’s just, I saw the seams? On that jacket? They’re _really_ awfully done. Like, abysmally bad. The leather is cut too thick so it won’t clean right and the threads aren’t sturdy enough to hold it all together after a few washes. Plus the fur is fake, if you wear it enough times it’s gonna start falling off in clumps.” There was a pause where she realized she was babbling, and she slowly sticks her hand out. “..I’m Niffty.”

The woman stares at her, nearly twice her height, and gives her a scathing look. “I don’t recall asking.” She looks back at the jacket, looking over the seams and fur. “But it looks like shit anyways.” She drops the clothes on the floor and moves to another rack, a few spring jackets meant more for looks than anything else.

Niffty glances back down at the jacket on the floor, and after a moment, she moves to pick it up, staring down at it before glancing at the price tag. “80 Princes for a shitty leather coat.” She squints at it, idly wondering how mad Rosie would be if she went about torching it and turning it into ashes then and there. She instead decides to throw it over her arm. “Yup. I’m burning this later.” She then glances up towards the woman, then glances toward the wall again, lifting a hand to point up towards a large blue reefer jacket, decorated with teal green floral designs. “That’s one much better. The fabric is sturdy, seams are tight, and the colors look properly dyed on so nothing will come out in the wash.”

“Oh.” She looks down at her again, the tentacles of her hair twitching in irritation. “You’re still there.” She looks up at the jacket on the wall, judging it for a moment, then goes back to shifting through the rack in front of her. She skims by the majority of the rack, spending most of her time on more of the highlighter-esque colors.

Niffty can’t help but feel herself giggle a bit at that comment, and she feels a grin grow on her face. “Yup. Still here. Not like I’m a ghost. Or am I?” Her grin turns a bit more cheeky but when the woman doesn’t laugh, she averts her attention to the woman’s own clothing. Very flashy, very neon, very much all about the glitz and glamour, and she nods twice. “Ahh, ok, ok. You’re more of the “bright colors” instead of the “deep darker colors.” Gotcha. How about...” Within an instant, she’s on the woman’s other side, and she points up to a large swing jacket with bright robin’s egg blue hues, lined with pink buttons and a neon green collar. “This?”

“Um.” She blinks down at her, taking a step back. “I’m not a child, so, no, and pastels are _so_ thirty years ago. Also, I didn’t ask.” She moves to another rack.

“Ah, right, right, sorry, sorry.” She winces, turning to face her as she walks. “I wasn’t trying to imply that you were a _child_ , trust me. I just, well, you know, mind starts running a mile a minute and next thing I know, I’m fucking up. Sorry.” There was a slight pause. “What _are_ you looking for, exactly? Maybe that would help.”

“I don’t _need_ help, so why don’t you just mind your own business and look for something pretty, hm?” She gives her a sickeningly sweet smile, nodding, and then returns to searching through the rack.

Niffty stares at her for a moment, almost looking dumbfounded, before she crosses her arms, her own grin starting to grow over her face. It wasn’t even a passive aggressive grin like one expected it to be. It was just a sweet smile. “Sorry, Miss. I was just trying to make sure you weren’t going to end up with a clothing choice that turns out to be a piece of utter shit in about a week. But it’s nice of you to not insult me to my face!”

The shirt in her hands clink onto the rack again as she rolls her eyes around to glare at her, a faint growl emanating from her. There’s a short staring contest, and then she crosses her arms. “Alright. You’re either really fucking stupid or rather brave. So which one is it?”

“I’m gonna have to say brave in this case. People _call_ me stupid sometimes, but I don’t really listen to them.” Her grin grows a bit larger, knowing _exactly_ what happens to the folks who call her stupid. She holds out her hand again. “Niffty. Pleased to meet you. And you are...?” She raises a brow expectantly.

“Helsa von Eldritch, of the Eldritch family.” She puts her hand on her hip, looking her up and down. “You know, if it weren’t for that Radio Demon being so protective of you, I’d have just killed you the moment you started bothering me.”

“Ah, so you know who I am?” She can’t help but let her grin turn a bit more vicious at that, and she chuckles. “It usually takes a couple of seconds for most people to realize who they’re talking to, but you did it right off the bat. Makes perfect sense for a Von Eldritch.” She folds her arms once it’s clear Helsa isn’t going to take her hand, still smirking. “Are you sure you don’t want my help? I’m an expert of cloth. Been sewing, knitting, and crocheting my whole damn life. And my afterlife too.” She moves a hand to gesture to her own dress. “Made this myself.”

“ _You_ made that?” Helsa raises a brow, looking her over again. “It’s not _horrible_. Suits you, at least.” She hums for a moment, then exhales. “Fine. I’m not looking for anything particular, though. Just trying to see if anything catches my eye.”

Her eye instantly seems to light up with glee and her grin somehow grows even bigger, almost to the point where it’s eerily similar to the Radio Demon’s own grin, her hands balling into fists that she holds to her chest, practically bouncing in place for a moment. “Ooooh! Perfect! You will not regret this, I _promise_ !” She moves to take a step back, then another, leaning forward on her tiptoes (or whatever the stumps of her feet could be called), her eye narrowing as her face scrunches up in concentration. “...Ok, ok, I _think_ I got it. One second.” 

Within an instant, she’s zipped off and now seems to be on the other side of the boutique, clothes visibly being torn off their racks and then flung into the air in dismissal, causing several perusing demons to practically fall over each other in an effort to get out of the store. All the while Niffty can be heard muttering to herself. “Nope. Too tacky. Ugh, too gaudy. Too _cheap_ .” There’s a slight pause where clothes aren’t being flung, followed by a hum of appraisal, then the blur of her bright strawberry red hair as it zips to the racks with the skirts. “Ok, ok, good, good, and it can go with _this_...”

"Heh." Helsa watches the chaos spreading through the store, watches the store clerks all stop what they're doing to stare, and smirks. "Wow, people really are scared shitless by that little thing."

One of them actually appears to be brave enough to step forward, reaching out a hand towards one of the unseen shelves that was getting Irma skirts tossed left and right. Their ears were flat against the back of their heads. “M-Miss Niffty-!”

“Can’t talk! I’m concentrating!”

“Y-You’re messing up the store!”

Within an instant, her head pokes up from the top of the shelf, shooting the man a withering glare, her teeth bared in a snarl. “Half of these clothes are nothing more than garbage anyways! You’re lucky I don’t go and tell Rosie that you’re counterfeiting her stamps!” 

The clerk immediately goes pale and quickly shuffles back to his post, and soon Niffty comes zipping right back over to Helsa, at least three different hangars of clothes in her arms. “Ok, I wasn’t able to find any shoes that fit the style, so I couldn’t make it a _full_ outfit, but I think _these_ can work.” She first holds up a large lilac colored frock, the fabric feeling quite soft to the touch, the fur of the interior that lines the collar and sleeves colored a dark black, buttons lining it’s surface rendered white, and with her other hand, she holds up what looks to be a black shirt lined with a tiger-striped color patterning, the stripes rendered a bright white along with sharp flecks of green. After that, she also holds up what looks to be a simple black pair of pants with a jagged lightning bolt going up each leg, colored a bright teal hue.

"Hmm..." Helsa hums, looking over the selection. She points at the pants. "I can work with that, but the others won't do. I need neons, _maybe_ bright jewel colors. The rest is too monochrome."

“Right, neon, got it.” She moves to hang up the pants on a nearby rack, before zipping back into the shelves, provoking another flurry of clothing to rise up around the store. This time, it only takes a couple seconds for Niffty to come back, this time holding up a bright neon pink wrap coat with a white collar and a white midsection belt, said belt appearing to be made of leather with golden metal attachments to it. She also holds up a shirt that appears to be white with long vertical neon blue stripes that line the surface of the fabric. “How about this?”

"Ooh, I love this coat." She takes it, holding it up higher. "I don't do stripes, though. Geometric patterns, sure. But not stripes."

“Got it.” She moves to zip back into the shelves, now the only thing being torn up through the air being shirts, audibly heard grumbling to herself. “Guh, I swear if I keep finding any more _handwash only shirts_ I’m going to _burn_ this boutique to the ground...” After a moment, there was a pause and the clothes ceased to be flung, before she comes back around the corner, wordlessly holding up yet another shirt, seeming to have a black backdrops but swarmed with a large splatter of dark blues and purples, mixing in with swirls of bright neon green.

"Oh, wow..." Helsa folds the jacket over her arm, picking up the shirt and holding it up to herself. "It's not what I'd usually wear, but it's pretty neat..."

Niffty’s grin seems to grow to frame her entire face, eye visibly crinkling up with satisfaction, and she moves to place her arms behind her back. “Yeah, I had to go rummaging a bit. There’s a lot of garbage in this place, but I think I managed to find the best pieces in here.” She lets her eye move to squint towards the rest of the boutique, and she moves to rest a hand against her hip, her other hand raising to idly flick her claws, index finger scraping against the pad of her thumb, creating a small spark of a flame, as if she was messing with a lighter. “If only it wasn’t in the middle of the Emporium..I’d gladly reduce all this junk to nothing but a sootstain.”

"Don't worry, I can put them out of business through social media." She flips out a phone, starting to type a few things out. She aims the camera at Niffty and snaps a picture of her.

Her eye flicks towards her at the camera flash, but after a moment, she lets out a giggle, stepping a touch closer. “Ohhh, I get it. Making it clear that I don’t like the place so no one will stop by anymore. Clever.” She smirks at that, pulling out her own phone. “I think I’ve seen your posts a few times on a few sites. Do you use InstaScare? Howler? Ooh, ooh, what about Fumblr?”

"All of the above, but mostly InstaScare. And all I need to do is tell people you're here and this place will sink. If you want to tell Hell you hate the place, that's your business."

“Hehehe. You sound like you’ve done this before.” She can’t help but smirk at that. “Just how many businesses have you shut down recently? I mean, if people will make this place sink simply from _me_ being in the same room, I can’t _imagine_ what kind of damage _you_ could do.”

"Eh, I do it whenever I get bored I guess. Or when the business pisses me off." She grabs the clothes and walks toward the cash register.

“Well, color me impressed regardless!” She moves to follow her, moving to tuck an earbud back into her ear, making sure to keep one unplugged. “People are just scared of me because of the man I work with, but you? Ruining lives and destroying people’s work on a whim with little more than a wave of the hand?” She stands there by Helsa’s side as she watches the store clerk frantically beginning to bag the clothes, chuckling. “I’ll admit, just killing people kind of loses its edge after a bit if you don’t spice it up, but something like that just sounds awesome.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” Helsa fishes through one of her pockets and tosses some coins onto the table, continuing to click through her phone. Notifications start plinking on her screen, mostly comments with lots of exclamation points on the end or ghost emojis. She starts tapping out a message to tag onto the post about the quality of the clothes, but she leaves most of her attention to watch Niffty. There’s no reason for her to stick around any longer. And no reason to make conversation about her murder habits. “Talking about your boss, does he _actually_ use social media, or are all the accounts of him fakes?”

“Huh?” She frowns for a moment, but in that split second, recognition fills her gaze and she shakes her head. “Oh, no, no, no. No, he doesn’t use anything like that. I don’t even think he has a _phone_ , much less an idea of the Internet. I’ve tried explaining it to him a few times now but he doesn’t really listen.” She snickers a touch. “You know that thing old people do when you try to show them a video and they just kinda squint at the screen? That’s him every time I try and show him something funny. I’d take a picture of it, but cameras tend to break if you try and use them on him. Busted at least 2 phones before I learned to stop.”

“Really?” She smirks, quietly admitting to herself that the picture that painted was rather amusing. At least she knew all the random accounts are in fact fakes. She’d have to make fun of Sir Pentious more often for getting so pissed with them all. The clerk finishes bagging her clothes and timidly hands them over. She snatches them and starts walking toward the door.

“Oh yeah. I think he just doesn’t like it when people take photos of him and everything, so he uses whatever kinda spooky powers he’s got to shatter the camera and fuck up the wiring. The accounts that I’ve seen on sites are either just fanatics trying to emulate him or just some stupid bots that try to cash in on all the terror he’s kicked up over the years.” The sound of her pattering feet make it quite clear that Niffty is still following her, still chattering away.

She’ll... actually have to keep that in mind. “Fanatics” in Hell often translates to cultists, and anyone who willingly aligns themselves to the Radio Demon to such a degree is.... Well, she’d be able to take them on, obviously, but she’d rather not have to deal with them. She pushes the doors open as she exits the shop, not holding it open for Niffty, and then pauses outside to scan through another app for other things she wanted to look for. Browsing hair supplies, certain slime products, plant food for one of her bell eaters, more clothes. She taps the edge of her phone, glancing down at Niffty as she hovers nearby.

Niffty herself momentarily glanced down at her phone herself, the screen visible, appearing to be a music app, and she was scrolling through a large selection of songs before selecting it and starting to play it. After that, she tucks the phone back into a pocket that lines her dress, and she moves to glance up toward her with a grin. “Well, you probably have someplace else to be, right? I don’t want to keep you waiting or anything, so I think I’m gonna go on my way. It’s been nice to meet you!” She extends her hand for a shake once more.

“Um... yeah, sure.” She hesitates for a moment, unsure whether this is some kind of ploy, but takes her hand anyways, giving her a solid shake. No sparks fly. No seal wraps their hands. “Thanks, for the tips, too.”

“Oh yeah, of course!” She seems to beam at the words, her grin somehow growing even more vibrant, showing off those sharp teeth of hers, and she pulls her hand back to give a short wave. “If you ever need more, don’t be afraid to send me a text, ok? I’m happy to help!” At that, she moves to place the earbud back into her ear, turns on her heel(?) and moves to zip off once again, several demons automatically backpedaling in an effort to get out of her way when they see her coming. 

Helsa watches her, brow raising as she considers her words. A strange one, definitely. Nothing she had expected, at least. She crosses her arms, unable to shake the feeling that there was something else to all of this. After a moment, she exhales and shakes her head, turning to start walking toward another store. She wasn’t going to worry too much about it all. Even if there was something else going on, she knew for a fact that she could easily kill her, precious sidekick of the Radio Demon or not. She wouldn’t be able to pull a fast one on her, not with a cheap grin and a little cute attempt to act friendly. She wouldn’t end up being used. Her tendrils idly twitch and shiver, a few of them starting to clench, as if aching to wrap around someone’s throat, and she lets an idle scowl cross over her lips. 

That Niffty girl was just some stupid little mortal anyway. What makes her think she could ever try and win against a Von Eldritch?

•••

“Ugh, just go die in a hole for all I care!”

There’s a growling gasp from somewhere behind her in the hall. “How dare you!? I made you and you-”

Helsa opens a door and slams it behind her, growling and tossing most of her bags onto her bed, running a hand over her tendrils to calm them from her bristled state, pacing over a bland carpet to try and get the grating voices out of her ears. All it manages to do is remind her how bare her room is, how empty of personality it is. No photos, no stylized blankets. Just a desk, a bookshelf, and a bed. She didn’t even get a choice in wallpaper. She takes a breath and stops herself from pacing, looking over the material goods she had purchased and snatching the ones full of clothes. She marches over to the far corner of the room and pulls a small, flat key from under the case of her phone. Her parents would probably kill her if they knew she had it, but there’s no way they’d find out. She covers her tracks too well. She slips the key into the lock and turns it, opening the door before returning it to its hiding place.

A walk in closet greets her, a light the shape of an eel flickering on above her and bathing the room in grey-blue light. She walks in, closing the door behind her, and walks to the end, pulling a half dozen dresses out of her bag as she does and hanging them in their respective spaces. She stacks a few boxes of shoes on a chest to be dealt with later. Then she walks further, straight toward the wall, with the rest of her clothes, phasing through the dry wall and into a room blazing with color, with neons and stripes and polka dots galore. There’s a massive fish tank stretched out under a plasma screen television, full of eels and other odd sea creatures. A fuzzy, oblong carpet with her signature pink and green in neat little rings covers most of the area. A play station rests next to the fish tank. A beanbag bed rests in the middle back of the room, and a rocking gamer chair sits in front of the television. 

Helsa takes a moment to sink against the wall, letting out a deep and heavy sigh as she runs a hand over her face, her tendrils still twitching, her skin still itching with agitation, already feeling her other mouths aching to tear through her skin to start gnashing, to start biting down on whatever it could reach. She glances over toward the fish tank, walking over towards it’s luminous glow to place her hand on the cold glass, and one of her eels, black scales lined with neon blue spots, and a long singular stripe, slowly moves to press the side of it’s face where her hand is, and she lets out another heavy sigh. “...I’ve lost track of how many times I tell you my parents suck, Medusa.” 

Medusa merely opens it’s jaws up and down, flashing it’s vile teeth in empathy. 

She can’t help but smirk at the sight. “Heh. Yeah, yeah. Trust me. When I’m Queen, I’m not gonna let them go easy.” She pulls her hand back, and a mere thought causes a large bloody piece of meat to manifest within the water of the tank. Both Medusa and Ursula, the other eel, colored with a brighter green hue and magenta stripes, both lunge for the food at once, as does the singular piranha fish that was also kept within the tank. She couldn’t remember what it’s name was. She didn’t think it mattered anyway.

Helsa watches the bloodbath for a moment, enjoying the view of blood spilling into the water, and then walks over to the bed, taking her clothes out and sorting through them. She should probably try out a few looks, post them on Instascare for her daily outfit. None of them pop out immediately. Well. None except for.... She exhales, rolling her eyes, and picks up the clothes Niffty had helped her find. Nefarious plots aside, she couldn’t argue with the woman’s eye for fashion. It’s definitely _different_ from what she wears, but not incredibly so. It’d mix up her portfolio without upsetting it. And it’d be interesting to see what her followers think of it.

She holds up the jacket first, taking a moment to actually examine the seams that were holding the sleeves to the torso, and unlike the large, almost cross-stitch sewings that had lined the leather jacket, these ones were nice, neat, looking tight and compact. She slowly removes the hook from the coat and moves to slip it on, finding the insides to feel nice and snug, soft to the touch, and it was enough to actually have Helsa smirk to herself. “Ok, I’ll admit, this one’s not bad..”

She turns to one of the walls, the section almost entirely mirror, and looks herself over. The fur compliments her, the pink pops out, and the belt manages to segment the look, making sure there isn’t too much of one color. She smirks and turns back to the bed, picking out the shirt and pants and bringing the rest to the walk in closet she had come from. She glances over her collection shoes, finding a blue, bedazzled pair of heels, and brings them back into the room. She takes off the jacket, puts it on the bed, and then takes off her shirt. She holds up the one Niffty had picked out, giving the abstract design another look, and slips it on.

She had to admit, the colors actually looked really good on her, even with the black backdrop. The swirls of green and blue and even purple, spattered like a messy smear of paint, certainly had a way of complimenting the hue of her skin and even her eyes. It was enough to make her smirk a bit wider, and her tendrils twitch, a bloom of satisfaction rushing down her spine. “Heh...Damn, this girl kinda has an eye for fashion, doesn’t she?” 

The satisfaction that immediately crashes and burns when she remembers the sight of that big beaming grin that Niffty has given her before she left, a cold realization shooting through her, one that screamed of anger, knowing that she was practically falling into the trap that the little cyclops had set, and she feels her grin twist down into a scowl. The urge to tear the clothes to shreds comes over her claws, but she stamps it down, considering she had spent her own money on the outfit to begin with. She merely scowls, growling with anger as she stares into the mirror, shame and irritation prickling over her skin and leaving her talons digging into her palms. “..Stop being an idiot, Helsa..”

Even if this was some ploy, she could capitalize off of it. There’s no use to be upset that someone else had offered the outfit. In the end, it’s _her_ choice to wear it if she wants, and it’s _her_ choice to mix and match the rest of what she has with it as well. None of that is controlled by anyone except herself. And she doesn’t have to post just one picture of the plain outfit. She could throw on a skirt or a different jacket and post photos of that as well. She could make it her own.

She shimmies out of her skirt, leggings, socks, and shoes, and pulls on the electric streaked tights.

It takes a couple moments for her to finally get the full outfit on, and after a moment of looking herself over, she can’t help but admit, begrudgingly, that it definitely looked quite nice, the color pallet being nice and balanced, the shirt being comfortable and the tights hugging her waist in a way that she couldn’t help but be a touch proud of. She pulls out her phone to mount it atop the holder that she had fastened to the wall just above her mirror, setting the timer before taking a small step back, wanting the camera to catch all of what she had with her, to give her followers plenty of trinkets to fawn over in petty jealousy and wish that they had her life. She makes a pose, giving the camera the middle finger, smirking in vicious smugness and sticking her tongue out, and when the camera flashes, she picks up her phone, looking over the picture, just to check there wasn’t anything creepy that leaked through into the footage.

It’s clear and pristine, the lighting perfect and the angle highlighting her figure in the exact way she wants. She sets her phone back on the wall and takes a few more photos in different poses, then goes into her closet, picks out a few different jackets and handbags, and takes more photos wearing those outfits. Once done, she flops onto her bed and starts skimming through for the ones she likes best. She can’t help but grimace in the face of a few, either because her smile was a bit too crooked or she saw what looked to be a bloody stain on the wall that definitely wasn’t there before, and by the time she reaches the end of her little photo spree, she has at least 3 serviceable pictures that she can use. She takes a moment to edit them, either to heighten the brightness or to get rid of a few smudges where some ghostly blob was sneaking through, and finally moves onto her Howler account to post them, her finger hovering over the pictures before she finally sighs and selects the one with the outfit that the cyclops has picked out for her. After a bit of pondering, the text cursor blinking almost ominously over the empty space, she moves to enter her statement.

_The Ruby Dragon was almost a complete and utter waste of time, save for this cute outfit. If any of y’all want to go burn it down for me, that’d be great, Kay, thanks. #Cute, #VonEldritch, #YouWishYouHadThis, #ShoppingTrip._

She looks it over a few times, then shrugs and hits send, moving to InstaScare to post a rather similar message as well. Then she leans back in the bed and waits for the torrent of responses. First the likes, then the reblogs, then the comments. Usually in that order. She trills her nails against the back of her phone, waiting for her phone to start vibrating incessantly.

After what seems like a minute, her phone does start buzzing off the hook, and as she lifts the screen toward her, not only does she see at least 50 likes (and more coming in) but also quite the few reblogs as well, most of them with comments about how the boutique, as they’ve heard, is also quite shit and that they would gladly go and burn the place down, be it in the middle of Rosie’s Emporium or no. It was enough to get her smirking a touch, chuckling to herself, though one particular comment caught her eye, made by some random demon with a stupid little nickname and a profile pic of some pink-furred goat.

_Hey, wasn’t the Firebug there too? You took a picture of her and posted it. What happened? Did she butcher the clerk?_

Helsa considers how to answer. Being too upfront would raise some red flags, make it clear they had talked. Then again, the photo she had shared was pretty close for comfort. For most demons, that is. She hums, then starts typing.

_Crossed paths with her in the store. She looked busy. I left after her._

She stares at the lines, then deletes the last sentence.

_Crossed paths with her in the store. She looked busy and left before I was finished._

A little bit of a lie in that. But she could say she had been considering going back inside. She hits send.

After a moment or two, even more comments began to buzz. 

_Oh my god! Did you talk to her?_

_Was the Radio Demon with her?_

_You know she has an account on here? You should check it out!_

Gods, she’s going to be the talk of social media at this rate. Niffty doesn’t seem the type to lie much, even if she’s a demon, and she seems rather open with opinions too.... Better to not lie.

_No sign of the RD. She waved and said hello._

Some of her tendrils twitched, and she couldn’t help but scowl to herself at how the comments kept flooding in, kept buzzing, her mood already starting to dip towards that of irritation. All because of one measly picture, suddenly her dashboard was being swarmed with nothing but mentions of that little cyclops, and though there were occasional comments of fanatics telling people to shut up to focus on herself, they didn’t seem to be listening. Her tendrils twitched a touch more, and she began to scowl even harder. “If she’s aiming to butter me up _then_ piss me off, I’d say it’s working..”

How could a simple demon be more popular than she is? How could all of Hell be more interested in some pretty little cyclops who smiles just to keep her position next to some upstart, silly, _ridiculous_ monster!? Her family may as well go hand in hand with Lucifer’s! People _know_ she can level a street just by thinking about it, can conjure anything she wants from any of the infinite realms. Yet they’re more curious about some dolled up pyromaniac. She huffs after a moment, silently stewing to herself before her eyes slowly trail upwards towards the search bar of Howler’s website. Her claws tighten into fists as she crosses her arms, her tendrils starting to twitch and thrash, as if aching to break free from their binds, and she’s half tempted to make yet another comment telling them all to knock it the fuck off or she’ll go and actually level a city street just to prove to everyone who serious she is. Then, after a moment, she simply silently moves to post the other two pictures of the other clothes she had posed with. It’s best to simply not fuel the fire, to not let them think anything happened, or that anything _will_. She painted it as a vague encounter, and a vague encounter it will stay.

Although, if this Niffty person is looking to try and get something from her, if she’s looking to bribe or blackmail, it would be all too easy for her to search her Howler page. She had her own phone, and she had been stupid enough to tell her about all the sites she went on. She could be looking at her webpage right now, and Helsa wouldn’t even know it. It was enough to make her growl to herself, and she felt one of the mouths on her arm open up to let out a foul hiss. Well, two could play at that. Niffty has an account on Howler? She may as well check it out, if only to see if she finds anything new that would click with her real life persona. Helsa scrolls through her comments, glancing around for mentions of Niffty’s account until she finds someone who had tagged her account. Great. Now Niffty _knows_ people are talking about her on _her_ posts. She bites back on another hiss, jabbing a finger at the handle and letting Niffty’s page load. 

The Howler title wasn’t exactly that impressive, for starters, simply reading as “ **Firebug** ”, but the fact that a little red pitchfork was shown to be right next to her handle’s name was enough to make Helsa scoff to herself. “Really? She’s fucking verified? Just because she’s some bootlicker to the Radio Demon?” She shakes her head, glancing toward the profile picture and even tapping at it to enlarge it, displaying the same grinning face that she had seen at the mall, and though she couldn’t exactly see that much of the background, it almost _looked_ to be that of a burning building. She vaguely recalls the fact that Niffty has remarked on burning the shitty leather jacket, and the small flame she had produced in her hand when she took the picture, and grumbled to herself. “So all you gotta do to get famous in Hell is flash a smile and start a fire or two? Pathetic.”

Her bio is plain and average. Died in 1958, lived in Pennsylvania (wherever the fuck that is), lackey to the Radio Demon since 1965, pyromaniac of nth degree. No pinned howl. No location. A link to a Fumblr account. Helsa rolls her eyes at that. Such an overrated site, Fumblr. She’d never link any of her own accounts. She scrolls down. There’s a few posts with some cutesy “Who misplaced the oregano!?!?” And “WHY IS THERE A STAIN ON THE CARPET????” But nothing immediately jumps out to her. The timestamps are recent enough, but infrequent. She switches over to a view of her media, coming face to face with some poorly taken selfies. Wrong angle, not the right distance, and definitely not the right camera. No filter even. A good smile, though.

There’s a video. The like, retweet, and comment are off the chart. And the Radio Demon is standing, blurry, in the thumbnail of the video.

Helsa can’t help but raise a brow at that, idly remembering the comment the girl had made about how the Radio Demon had no idea how to handle social media, and, more importantly, how cameras had a tendency to just break around him, most likely simply because the guy never wanted to be seen. She stares at the thumbnail for a moment, before finally moving to up the volume on her phone, just before pressing play. 

Within seconds, the thumbnail vanished, and there was Niffty, standing in front of a kitchen counter, the background displaying some kind of house, and it didn’t even really look that fancy. It looked more a rather standard apartment kitchen than anything out of some regular joe-schmoe that died via overdose, and in front of Niffty looked to be a whole thing of kitchen supplies, including several uncut vegetables, bottles of spices, and most notably, a whole uncooked chicken. Niffty’s voice immediately filled the air, and she looked just as chipper as she had been in the boutique. 

“ _Hello, hello, everyone! Thanks for coming! I hope you’re ready for another Cooking Lesson! This one’s gonna be a simple dish, one that doesn’t take a lot of prep, and, most importantly, tastes_ great. _Today, I’m gonna show you how to spatchcock a chicken._ ” At this, her eye narrows, and her grin turns a bit less jolly. “ _And before anyone has a chance to say anything_ , no, _its not that kind of cock. Keep any dirty stuff out of my cooking videos, please.”_

She snorts. So Niffty’s either some kind of prude, or generally doesn’t appreciate the sexual content that comes out of most denizens of Hell. Helsa momentarily wonders how many hearts she’s broken simply by saying no or nothing at all. She watches as Niffty goes about cutting into the chicken’s ribs, an unusual amount of strength showing themselves in the flawless effort of her movements. She talks the entire time, flowing easily between idle chitchat and helpful tips. Helsa taps the edge of her phone impatiently.

She taps the middle of the video to pause it for a moment, just to check how long it was, and finds that it’s strangely only about a minute long, and she was halfway through the minute, that being enough to get her to raise a brow in idle confusion. It’s only when she unpauses the video does she start to see the barest flecks of _distortion_ start to enter in the video’s frame, and that was enough to get both brows to shoot upwards. The distortion, the minor bolts of rainbow color, like the kind one would get it they pressed their finger really hard to a tv screen, slowly began to grow larger and larger, until a haze of red started to creep over the entirety of the video’s screen. She finally catches sight of something just off to the side of the screen, just barely peeking out from behind an open doorway, and all she sees is crimson eyes twisted into sharp dials, a sharp smile formed by massive fangs. 

Niffty’s voice begins to become consumed by garbled radio chatter, swelling like a monsoon through the speakers, and just as static starts to slide into the frames, her eye seems to widen as she turns, and just before both the video and audio cut out to nothing but static, she can just barely hear Niffty’s voice shout a single word. 

“ _Alastor_!”

The video devolves into a mess of static, monochrome and colors, and then cuts out to blackness. Helsa stares for a long moment, trying to figure out what exactly happened. Did... Did the Radio Demon do that as a prank, or did he just want to peek into the room? And Niffty actually sounded.... well, not _upset_ but definitely some mixture of surprised and annoyed. She definitely was yelling. At the Radio Demon. And lived to tell the tale. Post it online even. Wow, the girl must have some guts.

The video also seemed to have a link just below it that was labeled as: Not Ruined Version. Helsa contemplated watching it just for the hell of it, but then thought of something else. If people knew her as the Firebug, and people also knew that she stuck to the Radio Demon’s side as his weird attack-dog(?), then she must also have some strange following of fanatics that try to hunt her down too. Niffty even mentioned how there were crazy worshippers of the Radio Demon that tried to emulate his presence on Howler and other sites. So maybe, if she bothered to go and look...

She moves to open up another tab to Howler before moving to type in “ _Firebug Sightings_ ” into the search bar.

A dozen accounts pop up, some of which are bots pretending to be Niffty, while one with a massive follow rating is titled "Firebug Watch." She clicks on it and sees in the bio that the owner of the account is the very same Curious Watcher, an anonymous demon who keeps tabs of almost every physical appearance off all the Overlord's, notable demons, royalty, and otherwise popular denizens of Hell. A busy job, no doubt, but reliable, for the most part. She starts scrolling through the account, finding her own tweet from earlier in the day quoted. Apparently she managed to get the closest picture of Niffty since the 90s, which... Huh, that actually explains why everyone was so persistent about talking about Niffty over her. Not that she appreciated it, either way.

There's a few more photos, typically blurry and at a distance, of the Firebug darting around the streets or stores there's even one of her chatting with Rosie. Videos are somewhat less common, but still fairly frequent. Most are just barely ten seconds, trying to capture her darting across streets or through stores (apparently ruining retail employee's days isn't something new for her) but it's difficult to make her out for most of it. And then there are... not so nice ones. Bloody, gorey. A half dozen demons with assault rifles, all firing off their weapons trying to pin her down, only for her to stab them in the throats and through the back with a massive needle, giggling all the while. She sounds giddy. Happy. As if someone had told her joke rather than keeled over in front of her.

She scrolls down a bit more and is surprised to find a video that Niffty herself seems to have posted, one with a rather gruesome thumbnail of some crocodilian demon with his femur bone violently sticking out of his thigh, and it only takes a few seconds for Helsa to tap on it. Instantly, Niffty’s face is seen in front of the camera, and judging by the angle, not to mention the way said camera is also shaking, that Niffty herself if holding onto it, probably recorded through her phone. She sported that same grin as ever, though now it had a notably amused tint to it, her eye crinkled up in obvious fits of laughter, and even as she starts to speak, she can’t help but giggle. 

“ _Heheh-! Ok, ok, I know I don’t usually do this, I try to keep my channel clean, but I just can’t help myself! I-I broke this man’s leg, and-_ ” She visibly fights back the urge to laugh again as a rather loud, rather pitiful sob echoes from some place beyond the camera, sounding almost like a donkey than someone crying in pain. Niffty finally seems to be able to speak again, though just barely. “ _A-And he_ sounds-!” The camera shakes as it turns to face the very same bloody crocodile as it’s clutching it’s leg, mouth open as he wails with pain, and Niffty’s voice reaches a high shrill peak. “ _So! R-Ridiculous!_ ” She immediately starts to laugh, a high pitched cackle of laughter that seems to slip back and forth between loud and clear, to incomprehensible wheezes.

"Holy fuck." Helsa can't help the laugh that gets into her own voice. "This bitch means business." No wonder the Radio Demon has her by his side. She's like a miniature version of him, only she knows how to work a phone and doesn't seem to mind being on camera as much. There's no telling what powers she has or doesn't have at this point. Speed itself is deadly enough in Hell.

It’s only when she gets the notification across the top of her screen that she feels her grin, one that she hadn’t even realized slipped onto her face, fall immediately. One of them appears to be a reblog from one of the photos she just posted, the name of the handle that reblogged it makes her tendrils immediately _clench_. She moves to tap on the notification to enlarge it in full. 

_Firebug reblogged from your post: Oooh! It looks so good on you! Glad to see you’re wearing it! •)_

Another notification popped up seconds after.

_Firebug has followed you!_

"Oh, fucking _hell_ no." She sits upright, staring at the two notifications, wondering which one she should be worried about first. Niffty had all but told the entirety of Hell that they had more than just talked but had collaborated on her outfit. _And_ she publicly followed her. A few extra eyes pop up over her cheeks as she stares in befuddlement. She couldn't just refute her words. She couldn't lie. She couldn't say something contentious and leave it at that - she'd only dig her hole deeper at that. She can feel the internet, _Niffty_ cornering her on this. Waiting for her to slip up.

Why? What did she _want_ ? Why go public with this? Why post it directly to her own post? Was this all some kind of ploy to get under her skin? Or just the start of something bigger? Did the Radio Demon put her up to this? _Why_?

She feels more teeth start to sprout over her skin, growling and snarling and gnashing, and before she even realizes it, she can feel even the mouth on her stomach starting to rip itself open, seamlessly blending with her clothes to bare its fangs in a haunting growl. She can feel the magic brewing just beneath her claws, and it feels tempting, oh so tempting, to simply reach across the infinite layers of this afterlife and _destroy_ that little pest. Rob her lungs of air, turn her bones into jelly, freeze her blood in her veins, cause the very _cells_ that make up her existence to expand and _burst_ . There are so many ways she can go about orchestrating a death. So many ways to make it last _forever_.

But she knows it'd cause too much hassle. Too much drama. She'd be labeled as some too sensitive diva, or too eager a murderer. A reckless killer. Questions would be raised about timing, and the first person to ask them would the Radio Demon. Her parents either wouldn't care, or start 1933 all over again. Her brother would probably do something stupid if not incredibly neutral in her name.

So she does the next best thing: yell as much as she can across the internet at the source of the problem. She opens Niffty's DMs.

_What is your game? Why are you doing all of this? Who put you up to this? Huh? There's no use lying, just fucking tell me already._

There’s at least a few seconds of silence, total, infuriating silence, before a response is made. 

- _Huh? What are you talking about? What game?_

Helsa could throw her phone at the wall, but that'd get her nowhere. _You know what I'm talking about. Finding me at the store. Nagging me about clothes. Commenting about it publicly for the entire internet to see? Why are you doing that?? Who put you up to it?_

_-N-...No one?_

Oh good lord, she _types_ as if she’s talking.

_-I just thought I’d comment on the picture because I was excited to see you were wearing the outfit. Is that bad?_

Helsa fights the urge to slap her forehead. _Every single person in Hell is going to know you had something to do with my outfit today, and I_ never _let anyone pick anything for me. This is going to cause a whole shitstorm for me. Yes, it's bad!_

_-Oh. Oh fuck, jeez. I didn’t quite think of that. I’m sorry. •(_

A fraction of a pause. 

_-Is there anything I can do to help ease the backlash?_

She thinks for a moment, holding back on shouting "No!" at her. There may be one thing. Maybe. _Don't do anything, but if a bunch of people start asking you what you mean by your comment, reply to ONE of them that you just meant you had seen me with the clothes and thought it'd look nice. Maybe that you thought it'd tear. And we didn't talk long. Okay?_

 _-Right. Of course. Got it._ Were it not for the fact that Helsa had already met Niffty and seen just how chipper she was, she would’ve assumed that to be sarcasm. Another text pops up again just after the second. _And for the record, I’m not doing this for anyone. I’m not even all that sure about what you mean. I was just glad I saw the outfit. It looked cute!_

 _So you're just being nice for the hell of it?_ Helsa rolls her eyes at the idea. Likely story. _Not trying to butter me up or lay claims to being 'friends' or something?_

_-I mean, being friends sounds cool, but no, I wasn’t planning on anything. I just saw you pick up a horrible jacket that I knew you would hate because of how shitty it was made and wanted to warn you. I’m a professional, I’m sure my own dead body would be rolling in it’s grave if I let anyone buy that coat for 80 Princes! >•p _

She reads that over, huffing a little to herself. She couldn't deny that that was at least a little cute. A demon of her magnitude, drawing the line at poorly made apparel. She frowns at her phone, though. _The Radio Demon didn't put you up to this?_

_No. Why would he? I’m quite certain he doesn’t really care about your family to begin with. Or really any kind of vast political schemes going on in Hell in general._

That... would make sense. Alastor is known to be incredibly apolitical. Sure, he hates Vox, but supposedly for more personal reasons than political ones. But he's always plotting something nefarious. Usually with a larger impact than initially expected. Still, there has to be something Niffty gets out of this. There _has_ to be.

Another buzz from her phone as Niffty sent another text.

- _If I may ask, why do you think I’m wanting to get something out of you in the first place? All I did was pick out a cute outfit for you, and I did it because I wanted to help you find something that wasn’t shitty._

Helsa tilts her head back, then exhales and flops onto her side on the bed. She shouldn't have said anything. Or at least, she should have just chewed her out and left it at that. _This is Hell, Niffty. Everyone has a reason for everything._

_-Well, my reason was that I wanted to help you. That’s it. I know it may seem dubious coming from me, the righthand to the Radio Demon and all, but it’s not like I don’t operate outside of his orders or anything. I’m my own person, and I chose to help you out. •)_

_Pardon me for being skeptical._ She drops the phone to her chest for the moment.

- _Oh yeah, of course! I’m not blaming you for being paranoid. A little confused at first, yeah, but blaming you for being careful would just be rude of me! I’m just trying to soothe some of that confusion so you don’t need to constantly tiptoe around me at all times. That’s_ my _job. Heheh._ •)

Helsa rolls her eyes, unable to keep back a smirk. Evidently, Niffty had taken in some of the Radio Demon's humor, if in a more muted fashion. _That's good to know._

_-By the way, I wasn’t kidding when I said those clothes looked good on you. I know that may sound like I’m patting myself on the back there but you really make them work._

She smirks. _Yeah, I've noticed. You should check out my InstaScare if you wanna see more. I've done all the fashion and makeup challenges for over a decade._

 _-Duly noted! I’ve got my own on there too, if you want to check it out. It’s less about clothes and more about food, just FYI. I’m not only a professional at clothes after all! |_ )

After a slight pause there’s another text.

_-That’s supposed to be a wink. Hard to tell with only one eye._

Helsa snorts, shaking her head. _Adorable_. She doesn't know what else to say to that.

- _Aw, thanks. Anyways, sorry again for the little slip-up. I never would’ve made the comment if I knew it would be such a big issue._

 _Yeah, just, keep it in mind next time._ She pauses for a moment, then adds, _I've gotta get going._

_-Oh, of course! Don’t let me distract you from anything you need to get done. I’ve got stuff I need to do anyway. See ya! •)_

Helsa stares, considering replying, and then just turns off her phone and sets it on the mattress under her. She takes a moment to rub over her face, letting out another sigh, taking a moment to just let her head flop back against the bed, trying to process what just happened. Either Niffty was telling the truth and the Radio Demon really wasn’t trying to use his righthand to snatch her into a scheme, and she really was just trying to help, or she happened to be lying, and she was trying to lull her into a false sense of security. What was troubling her was that she couldn’t tell which was which. It was enough to make her tendrils twitch, already feeling some irritation starting to creep down her spine. She couldn’t quite read this girl. She made no sense. One moment she was making soft quaint cooking videos and offering her clothing advice just so she didn’t waste some of her own money, and the next she was breaking people’s legs and laughing at the sounds they made as they cried in anguish. It was a strange coin to be sure, one she couldn’t exactly make heads or tails of.

Maybe she can be lucky enough to ignore it. Have this all be some one off, awkward situation the both of them can forget about. It’s not like she’s ever run into Niffty before. Sure, on occasion she’s in the same room as Alastor thanks to some event her parents force her to attend, but she never stays long. Enough to have said she was there, and then _gone_. Maybe a few snacks on the way out. She huffs and sits upright, looking around the all too quiet, all too empty room. Thinking had always been a problem for her. Overthinking. She needs to stop thinking. Too bad she’s out of alcohol.

Her gaze turns to the television and play station set. Maybe gaming would help, at least for the moment. Virtual killing doesn’t attract so much attention anyways. She pushes herself upright and makes her way to the gaming chair, sitting down with a small huff. Medusa and Ursula swirl in their tank. “Yeah, yeah, tell me about it.”

The gaming station chimes on and she lets herself sink into unreality.

•••

Considering Hell seems so similar to Earth from the start of one’s afterlife, it only takes a keen eye to recognize the biggest differences within it to truly recognize its a different place entirely. For one, there’s the fact that everyone in Hell are demons, from the smallest imp to the King itself. The second matter is the fact that angels descend from the skies at the end of every year to rip into all the demons they can find and leave them as little more than bloody corpses. The third thing, something that tends to be a little lesser known depending on how close or far one lives to a shore, is that Hell has no oceans. What would normally be swamped by vast swathes of water and sea life, is only replaced by deserts, rocky canyons, that seem to extend into darkened abysses, and the heat of a twilight moon that seems to roast everything within the deserts alive from the moment they cross the threshold. Despite the setback of oceans being gone, this doesn’t stop the souls of Hell from trying to replicate all the luxuries of life anyway they can, in any fashion they can possibly muster. That’s how places like the Jagged Rock Pier get started.

The Jagged Rock Pier is Northwest of Pentagram City, at first having been built in 1923 to act as a major fishing attraction for the massive lake it was a mile away from, notably named Jagged Rock Lake due to the massive amounts of it’s namesake that are scattered across the bottom of the lake’s surface. But once it was discovered that the lake in question was home to massive fire breathing sharks, the fishing business quickly dried up, and the entire boardwalk, with all of its buildings and amenities to be left to rot. It’s only when other demons found it rotting away in the 70’s that it began to rise back into the word of the public tongue, revamped into yet another place of debauchery and sin where people can come to just waste their nights (or weeks) away. Casinos and gambling dens are sequestered away in the deep basements of the old, rotting corpses of what used to be storage houses, where people gamble their money away in hopes of getting rich. Kiosks and vending machines line every pathway the boardwalk takes, ready to sell food, drugs, and alcohol to all who pass by for insanely cheap prices (usually only about 30 Presidents or so), and down in the grasslands of the forests is where demons come from all around to throw massive parties, topped off with blazing bonfires. 

But the most important, and most popular attraction of Jagged Rock was no doubt being that of The Pits, sequestered below the Pier’s very beams, hidden away within a tunneled out cavern that was slowly dug out of the side of the hill that the Pier curled itself around. Within this cavern was nothing more than a rounded dome of metal and bars, a cage to seal in those who take to the ring, while wooden bleachers and metal balconies line the sides of the cavern, meant to act as seats for commentators to watch, to place bets, and to witness the bloody carnage that was soon to follow.

Tonight, the crowd is at its usual roar, music pumping in the background as two demons of comparable sizes duke it out within the pit, blood spilling on the floor and making the terrain difficult to navigate. Some of the onlookers dance while others trade money and make bets. There’s a few people having an orgy in one of the corners. Drugs and alcohol pass around as communally as a frat party’s kool-aid. And above it all, in the best seat, lounges the proprietor of this fine establish, holding three massive vodka bottles in her lap alongside the dusty remains of too many blunts to count. Helsa von Eldritch, the perfect heir to the Eldritch Empire, smiles widely and lazily as one of the competitors gets slashed across the chest, blood spurting everywhere and even getting on some of the onlookers. She sprawls out in a massive, grungy throne put together with whatever scrap metal had been left behind in the 70s, some honest metal working skills, and dozens of cans of metallic and neon spray paints. And cushions, of course. She isn’t some kind of masochist.

She takes a swig from the third vodka bottle, some top notch brand if her memory is right, and giggles as the cage below shakes against the weight of a thrown demon. Her entire body is blissfully floaty and lightweight and heavy and perfectly empty of all thoughts except the present. She could have gotten entirely shitfaced the moment she picked up a bottle, of course, but that would have ruined the fun, you know? So instead, she lets her usual, immortal threshold lower so she can enjoy the toxins of the lesser beings. It’s wonderful, she loves it, and the only thing she can regret is that she’s run out of blunts that are comfortably within arm’s reach. The crossed feeling of being high and drunk at the same time is starting to wear out. She doesn’t particularly mind it, but she does notice it. Oh well. She’ll have to ask for someone to get her one soon.

It’s only when there’s a loud _snap_ from within the cage (a demon’s horn being broken off) followed by a loud scream of pain, does the crowd almost entirely fall into an uproar of excited screaming and chanting for more blood, for more death and dismemberment, save for those still locked into the orgy, and it was enough to make Helsa giggle to herself. She idly wondered what it would be like to raise her hand into the air and turn her thumb downward, like she was some kind of Emperor of that one fargone era on Earth that she can’t quite remember the name of, silently and unquestioningly commanding the lesser and weaker of the duo fighting in the dirt like worms, to be silenced, to be put to death, to be snuffed out of existence. She knew she could do it, could put an end to all of them in a moment, and in her state of carefree intoxication, it was enough to make her grow the biggest grin on her face. Here she was Queen, and she loved it. 

It was then, as the crowd settles back down, that she catches sight of a familiar flash of magenta hair, of a burning orange eye, and for a moment, she can’t help but find her eyes pulling away from the bloodshed to stare, watching as Niffty sits in the stands, eagerly watching the combat down below with a grin on her face and what looks to be a giant plastic container of pretzel bites in her lap. She stared even longer upon realizing that it really _was_ her sitting there, that it wasn’t just a drunken mirage or some lookalike trying to play coy. The Firebug Niffty knew of the Jagged Rock, and she was there in the Pits, watching the fighting, the bloodshed, the show of gore that was meant for _her_.

Helsa's grin widens at the realization. She knew she attracted some intriguing clientele, mostly it's the younger people, the ones with nothing to worry about should someone kill them, who come by. Does Niffty even know this is Helsa's territory? That she had been the one to pull all this useless crap together to make something the general populace could take enjoyment from? She glances at the two empty bottles next to her and picks one up. The cage is a large target, even for someone as inebriated and intoxicated as her. But maybe that would be too much attention to pull. She leans over one of her armrests and peers back at one of the demons sitting behind her, macking on someone she's never seen before. "Hey, Charles? Charles!"

He startles out of the kiss, the other demon pouting but continuing to nuzzle over his throat. "What? What is it?"

"There's a-" She laughs a little, showing off her teeth. Her arm waves and the bottle goes flying somewhere, shattering, and she giggles again. "There's a special guest on the first floor. Firebug. Get her for me."

Charles, suddenly looking a bit less dazed and drunk and a bit more alarmed, blinks up at her like she had suddenly decided to rip her own jaw open. “F-Firebug?” He glances down toward the first floor, then back toward her, then down at the armcandy he’s currently got sitting in his lap, and sighs, before moving to stand, awkwardly trying to peel the other demon’s arms off of him. “Fine, Fine..I-I’ll be- _hic_ -..I’ll be right back.” With that, he stumbles off down toward the first floor of the rings, awkwardly shambling, leaving the armcandy behind to pout, folding their arms and glaring down at nothing. 

It takes at least a minute for Charles to finally come stumbling back, and when he does, Niffty was following right behind him, still clutching her giant container of pretzels in her hands, and the moment she sees Helsa, her face _lights up_ in that massive beaming grin, immediately moving to walk up closer toward the foot of the throne. “Oh my _God_ , you’re here too? Holy shit, I had no idea! How are you, how have you been?”

“Hah! Knew it.” Helsa snickers, gulping down some more vodka. “You don’t know a single thing about this place, huh?” She grins widely, setting the bottle next to her legs and leaning on it as she watches Niffty. “I _own_ this place.”

Niffty’s grin seems to drop into a fascinated sort of awe, her mouth turned into a soft little gasp as her eye visibly widens. “Woah, you do?” Instantly the grin comes back, even wider than ever. “Wow, that’s amazing! I’ve been coming down here for years and I’ve never seen you here before!” She takes a moment to glance over the throne in question, chuckling to herself. “Wow, you’re like the Queen of this place, aren’t ya?”

“Pretty much!” She laughs a little, moving to lean on an arm of her throne, her bottle wobbling and clinking here and there. “I’m - I’m pretty curious about you, though. I wouldn’t have expected you to visit a place like this. And years? Aw, I’ll take that as a compliment.” She beams at her widely.

“Pfft, you kidding?” Niffty’s grin turns into more of a smirk. “I don’t stick to Alastor’s side like glue _all_ the time. I like to go about doing my own thing sometimes! And, well, I have to admit..” She moves to gesture a hand towards another archaic splash of blood from within the cage. “This place certainly is fun.”

“That is the idea.” Helsa leans her head in her hand. “Anything and everything a demon could want to relax, all in one place. And for low prices too!” Her head swims for a moment, the image of Niffty in front of her distorting for a moment, but all she does is hum and drops her head further onto her hand, nearly parallel with the ground now.

She hears the sound of Niffty’s chuckle in her ears, sweet and sounding like bells in the air. “Heheh! Well, guess I’m gonna have to find a way to thank the Queen of Jagged Rock, huh?” The sight of a pretzel bite comes into her sense of view, looking to be covered in sugar. “Want one?”

“Hmm....” She could probably stand to eat something. Not that she has to or anything. “Sure!” She straightens in her seat and holds a hand out, the motions a bit lethargic and less graceful than usual.

“Cool.” She places the pretzel bite in her hand, moving to pick up another from the container, popping one into her mouth. “These things are practically half the reason I come here. They’re stupidly delicious. Can’t get enough of them.”

"Yeah? I don't eat much around here, honestly." She pops the pretzel into her mouth, munching on it. "Mm. Yeah, it's pretty good." Helsa eyes her for a moment. "Have you had any drinks yet?"

“Hm?” She glances up at her, before she shakes her head. “Not yet. I mostly go for the sweeter drinks, believe it or not.” She glances down toward the bottles scattered at Helsa’s feet, and she can’t help but smirk a touch. “Heheh. Something tells me you and Al would get along quite well if you can drink vodka from the bottle like that.”

"Oh, does the Radio Demon like his liquor?" She chuckles at the thought, mostly because it's obvious but she hadn't thought of it before. "There's Mai Tais on the docks if you want something fruity." She smirks at the image that comes to mind. "The mango ones would fit your look."

“Mai Tais, you say?” She raises her brow, somehow having the guts to smirk right back. “Sounds like fun to me. Wanna come with? If you went and singled me out in a crowd like this, you must be pretty bored.” 

At that, the fight from within the cage seems to erupt into a violent squirt of blood, and the crowd at once all seems to erupt into massive cheering all over again. Niffty herself seems to wince a touch at the noise, reflexively, but still finds herself giggling. The view from the throne in particular was no joke. She could see everything from this angle.

Helsa opens her mouth to answer, then pauses to smirk and laugh at the gorey display below her. After a moment, she looks back at Niffty. "You want someone to drink with? Yeah, sure."

“Sounds good to me. You think you can walk? Or are you going to need help?” Niffty moves to take a step back to allow Helsa to rise to her feet. “I mean, I dunno how much I _can_ help you walk, but I can keep you off the ground if you’re ready to fall.”

"Nah, I'll be fine." She waves a hand and straightens, wobbling for a moment. She drains some of the alcohol from her system, so she's not quite to dizzy. Her arms stretch up over her head and she starts walking, moving through the aisle behind her. "Time for more _booze_!"

Niffty watches her for a moment before shaking her head and moving to follow, slowly making her way through the crowds and up towards the front entrance, the hole that leads to the outside being lined with pipes as railings and metal slabs to make up the floors. The air of the twilight is cool, refreshing from the heat within the caverns, and as both Niffty and Helsa move to slide down from the Pit’s edge, they meet the dry dirt and the dull, dry grass that makes up the forest’s floor. The wooden beams of the Pier surround them, almost as tall as the trees that make up the forest, bereft of greenery, reduced to blackened husks, as if the magic of Hell itself was preventing them from growing. Helsa barely seems to notice the change in temperature, her face still flushed a darker shade of grey-black, though her tendrils curl and uncurl in the air. She stretches her arms over her head, her pink jacket fluttering a little in a gentle breeze, nails and jewelry on her hands sparkling in the dimness of the night. “Ahh.... As much as I love watching two meatheads fight it out in that cage, it does get boring after a while. Only so much to see, y’know?”

“Yup, I get what you mean.” Niffty chuckles a touch, flashing a grin as she moves to start walking through the grass, just slow enough that Helsa could properly keep up, tossing another pretzel into her mouth. “‘S mostly why I come here, sometimes. I like working for Al, but sometimes even killing people tends to get boring. Meanwhile, in a place that draws _this_ much attention, you never know what could happen.”

“Yeah, I get that.” She brings her arms back down to her sides, rolling her neck a little. She doesn’t quite walk in a straight line, but she’s fine with that. So long as she isn’t falling on her ass. Her head is still light and airy, but the relative quiet of the outside is starting to pull her out of her stupor. “Where is Al anyways? I wouldn’t mind meeting him some day, even though he seems a bit creepy.” She frowns. “Don’t tell anyone I said that.”

“Hehehe!” There again comes that bell-like giggle, and this time Niffty turns to face her, walking backwards with a ease that she hasn’t seen in any demon before. “Oh, he’s around. Probably off some place in the Pier getting drunk out of his mind on everclear. Either that or eating someone. He has this habit of completely wrecking speakeasies and the like whenever he decides to get hammered, and when he gets drunk, he tends to get hungry.” She blinks,as if remembering something. “Oh, uh, _metaphorically_ wrecking speakeasies I mean. He’s not gonna trash the place when it gives him a lot of booze.”

“I wouldn’t care either way.” She waves a hand. “I’m not about to stop him, unless he tries taking my _wonderful_ throne.” Helsa curtsies, her tone indicating some kind of sarcasm. She stumbles a little, but rights herself and continues walking. “Mm, you sure you don’t want any vodka?”

“Hmmm..” She seems to grimace a touch, as if she was debating it, still walking backwards, though she does stifle a bit of a laugh at the attempted curtsy. “I dunno. I’m not really aiming to get smashed, especially when you’re looking a bit wobbly yourself. Besides, the fresher air will clear your head a bit. The walkway up to the Pier isn’t that far.” She flashes a sugary sweet smile, popping another pretzel into her mouth as she does so. “You won’t mind if people see us talking, right?”

“Fuck people.” Some of the drunken happiness fades from her face at the question, and she scuffs a shoe against the ground, looking aside and scowling. “I’m done caring about what people think. It’s overrated.” She means to say more, but those are the words that come out, and she doesn’t put the effort in to expand on her meaning.

That gets Niffty to blink, and that sweet beaming smile that almost reminds Helsa of the light of the twilight moon, fades away, and a look of clear concern slowly overtakes it. Niffty moves to her side, and after a moment, she moves to press a hand to her arm, giving it a consoling pat. “You ok? Is something bothering you?”

“I... I’m fine.” She pulls her arms away after a few seconds, crossing them under her chest. She can feel the chill air on her skin through her palms now. She can’t remember the last time anyone had asked her those questions, and she’s fairly certain that’s because of more than just the alcohol. She exhales heavily. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“....Alright. I understand.” Niffty still looks concerned, but looks ahead as the walkway, a massive uphill set of stairs, comes into view. “You don’t have to tell me.”

Helsa looks down at her, not quite expecting the words, and her shoulders relax a little from their position. She exhales again and drops her arms, grabbing a hold of the railing as she mounts the stairs. “Thanks.”

“Of course.” Niffty nods softly, starting to climb the stairs as well, slowly, keeping pace with Helsa. “..Want me to pay for the drinks?”

“I’m rich. I can pay.” She goes quiet, unsure what to say. She can feel reality creeping back in, unsettling her skin and bringing that sicking feeling of despair back to her. Maybe she shouldn’t have given up so much of the alcohol in her system.

“Right..” Niffty seems to shift, still looking concerned, before a soft, hesitant grin starts to lift up her lips, even as they climb. “Want to hear a joke?”

“Hm, sure, might as well.” She smirks a little, remembering the horrid jokes she had gotten over social media. “Gimme your best.”

“Heheh..Ok, ok, let’s see...” She seems to ponder for a moment, before smirking. “Why are there gates around cemeteries?”

“Um...” Helsa frowns, the entire concept of cemeteries largely foreign to her. She recalls something about tombs, something about... digging? Or was it burning? “I dunno. Why?”

“Because people are _dying_ to get in!” She bites her lip, stifling a giggle.

“Pff-” Helsa snickers, furrowing her brow at the little cyclops. “Wow, that was terrible. I love it.”

“Oooh, you like bad jokes?” Her smile suddenly gains an excited edge, and she giggles again, skipping around to her other side, practically hopping from foot to foot despite the fact that they’re still climbing the stairs. “Ok, ok, uh... Why do fish live in salt water?”

“Uh...” She tries to figure out some kind of reason. There’s plenty of _real_ reasons, but... “They said _Na_ to land.”

“Pfft-!” That gets Niffty to giggle again, and her smile stretches to the point where it almost looks like it hurts. “N-No, but that’s good too. It’s because pepper makes them sneeze!”

“Hah.” Helsa smirks at the compliment, then snorts at the response Niffty makes. The sound is strange coming from her, sounding both close but far, and bows a bit as she considers it, laughing quietly. “Heheh, ‘cause _salt_ water, and salt and pepper. Hah, I like that one. It’s pretty good.” 

“Heheheh. I know. The first time I heard that one, I laughed for like, 5 minutes.” She laughs through her words, lifting a hand up to rub at her eye. 

Helsa snickers, watching Niffty as they make it to the top of the staircase. There’s a bit more noise, a bit more external stimuli to lose herself to, and she takes the moment Niffty spends rubbing her eye to look around the pier. There’s a long, winding row of buildings, some still standing and other caving in on themselves, but all strewn about with fairy lights (honest fairy lights, not the Christmas store knock offs) that glimmer and flicker in the night. There’s a few fast food stands handing out sweets and small meals to those willing to pay for them, and little flocks of demons mill about, chilling with friends or ogling at the different foods they could try. There are a few glowing signs here and there pointing out which way would be what notable place, but she doesn’t need to be told that the massive flashes of colorful light is likely the location of the largest and rowdiest alcohol party outside of the Pit.

Niffty herself soon moves to glance around towards all the lights, towards the sights and sounds that surrounded them, and though she could see a few signs that pointed to bars below the surfaces of the Pier, or casinos tucked away into the interiors of certain buildings, she found that her eye is also drawn towards the kaleidoscope of colors and the distant thumping of music, and she feels herself chuckle. “Well, we wanted booze, and this is pretty much the best place to get it. Any particular places you want to go to first?” She glances up toward Helsa, grinning in a more excited fashion now.

“Hmm....” She considers the massive party in the distance, but something tells her that running headlong into a group of people without being properly drunk isn’t something she would be eager to deal with. “There’s a little hole in the wall down this way. It’s one of my favorite places for mixed drinks.” She starts walking down the pier, running a hand over her hair as they start moving toward the groups of people wandering the boardwalk.

“Oooh, please, lead the way. I always love discovering new places in here. It seems like there’s always more and more just popping up everywhere!” She finally moves to toss her container of pretzels into a nearby trash can before moving to walk by Helsa’s side, a skip practically in her step. “So, did you _make_ this place, or did you just declare yourself the owner?”

“Well, _I_ didn’t make this place, but, like, I got it together.” She shrugs, glancing down at her before continuing to look forward. “Some people were already starting to do things here and there, so I started putting things together to, uh.... streamline things. The key is to just keep on adding one thing at a time.”

“Ooooh, I get it. You basically started funding the place.” She glances toward one of the more dilapidated buildings, idly wondering why some of them haven’t been built back up yet. “Well, it’s still a pretty sweet thing you have down here. I could never think to do something like this. The closest thing I would’ve gotten is Al’s whole circus gig, but he got bored of that before we met.”

“Yeah? I remember when he was doin’ that. It was pretty... whack.” She winces at the word, hoping no one had overheard her say it. “I mean, it was kinda lame, but the fact that he pushed it so much made it kinda... interesting? But not the actual circus. The people who went to see it. People really get bored in Hell.”

“Oh, I hear that.” She rolls her eye. “Thank God for social media and all that. I know I was born in the time of World War 2, and I know I’ve lasted a good while since I lived before social media even existed, but now that I know all about it, I dunno if I could go without it again. You know?” She glances up at her expectantly.

“Oh, definitely. I’m, like, _way_ older than you and I feel the exact same.” Helsa rolls her eyes. “There’s just something about instant communication that’s nice in this dimension. And it’s not even an _invasive_ kind of communication. It’s just, like... there. You can look at it or not. It’s nice.”

“Oh yeah. And it’s always _changing_ too. One second it’s the same thing, and then the very next second, there’s something new! And it never stops! Sure, a book or a movie or a tv show, all of that is great, but they’re all... _stagnant_ , you know? They stay the same. They grow dull. They lose their luster. It’s never the same the second time around.”

“Almost like your boss.” She blinks, then looks down at her. “Tell him I said that and you die.”

Niffty almost seems to stop dead at that, a single foot in the air, and for a moment, she doesn’t move. Then, after a moment, she simply moves to keep walking, crossing her arms and simply shrugging with a sigh. “No worries, I won’t tell him.“

“Good.” Helsa relaxes as Niffty continues walking, stretching her arms over her head again. “Ugh, I wish this place was closer. I’m kinda in the mood for gin, though. Something minty. And they’ve got some of the good stuff.”

“Do they?” She tilts her head at that. “What’s the place called anyway?”

“Deluxe Manhattan.” She shrugs. “Not sure what it means, but apparently it’s a riff off some mixed drink on Earth.” She moves to the right side of the walkway, not even bothering to wave or even acknowledge some of the people who notice her.

“Oh, I think I’ve heard of that!” She moves to follow, causing two rifts to appear in the crowd, both of them making way for the two fearsome demons that were cutting through the flow like a hot knife through butter. Niffty heard and sees the flashes of cameras in her vision, and she narrows her eye as she turns to glare at them. “...Want me to take care of that?”

“Nah, it’s fine.” Helsa rolls her eyes again. “Cameras don’t work well on me. Kinda like RD, but, uh... some different reasons, I imagine. Eldritch and all. They’ll just get a bunch of smudges and eye melting imagery.”

“Oh, really?” She glances up at that, looking surprised, but also fascinated. “That sounds cool. How does that work?”

“It’s, uh....” She squints for a moment, trying to figure out how to word it. It’s difficult to put into words a mortal would understand, but.... “Oh! We’re here!” She beams, stopping in front of a building with a lit up arrow pointing to the side and then up. “There’s some stairs on the side. The whole place is on the roof.”

Niffty takes a moment to stop, one foot already out to take another step, causing her to stumble a touch, but after a moment, she cranes her head up in an attempt to catch a glimpse of said roof bar, a grin coming to her face. “Heheh. Wow. That’s amazing. And creative.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty neat.” She starts walking toward the little niche between the buildings, stepping up onto the staircase in the shadows there.

“Any recommendations when it comes to drinks?” She also moves to follow, though she decides to start sliding _between_ the bars of the upper staircase, leading her to be at least one more floor above Helsa, rather than behind her. “Gotta warn you, my tolerance isn’t _as_ strong as yours. Can’t go downing vodka like you.”

“Oh, I’m used to that.” She waves a hand, following her at an easy pace. “You seem like a mai tai or daiquiri kinda person. Sweet rum, sugary, fruity. You can ask the bartender to go light on the alcohol if you want. Best part of mixed drinks if you ask me.”

“Heheh. You really know your drinks, don’t you?” She can’t help but smirk at that, chuckling to herself. “Remind me to ask you to make me a drink sometime, when we aren’t heading up to a rooftop bar.”

“Sure! Maybe when I’m more sober, though.” She chuckles a little, jogging up the stairs to catch up with her. “I’m a dangerous mixer.”

“Oooh. Sounds fun.” She chuckles again, just as the both of them finally reach the top of the building, exposing a rather wide area that had quite the few amount of demons bustling about, with waiters carrying drinks and food to tables, as well as three bartenders all gathered together behind one massive bar, decorated with neon lights, a polished wooden structure, and even a TV balanced on a shelf for those sitting at the bar to watch. The edges of the roof was lined with a massive railing in order to prevent demons from falling off, and there were at least 6 tables in all, the very last one, sat the closest to the edge, looking to be empty, said table covered with a lilac plaid sheet. Niffty glances around at the view of it all, before glancing up toward Helsa. “So, do we just sit ourselves down or..?”

“Yup! Probably wanna order first. I can order and you can grab a seat.” She starts walking toward the bar. “Mango, strawberry, blueberry, or raspberry?”

“Oh, uh, raspberry! Definitely!” She glances around and her eye catches the last table lining the edge of the roof, only lined with two chairs. She moves to walk toward it, taking care to not acknowledge the people that turned their heads to stare in her direction. She was more than used to it by this point.

Helsa continues on her way to the bar, one of the workers noticing her and sliding her way. “I’d like a lemon-lime gin and a... raspberry daiquiri please. Light on the daiquiri.”

“Coming right up.” The demon smirks at her, grabbing two glasses and starting to fill them. “Half and half on the gin?”

“Or a little more on the gin.” She lets her grin widen further, cocky as ever.

“Very well then.” The bartender grabs a bottle of light blue liquor and pours it over ice until the glass is two thirds full, filling the rest with what amounts to Sprite and topping it with a sprig of mint. “Daiquiri will be ready in a moment.”

“Of course.” Helsa pulls the glass closer to her, sipping and leaning against the counter. Her eyes catch the sight of Niffty sitting over on the far other end of the rooftop, legs idly swinging back and forth in her chair, her head turned away to gaze out into the view of the forest and lake beyond, and though Helsa can’t see her face, she’s certain of the kind of smile Niffty has on her face at the moment. A soft, quiet kind of smile that could always shift into a beaming grin that shows off all of her perfect little teeth. She could almost compare it to Hell’s moon, but the moon itself didn’t do it justice. Her grin was somehow...brighter, than that. Immensely bright. Amazingly bright. Like a fire. Like...Like the Earth’s sun. She heard tales of how the sun was always amazingly bright, and though she’s never seen it, something in her mind tells her it was an apt comparison.

She suddenly recalls Niffty’s penchant for burning buildings and setting people’s shoelaces on fire and can’t help but laugh a little to herself. Such a strange little demon. Always so lackadaisical. But so very, very deadly. And her she is, drinking with her. Sharing her favorite prowling grounds. The feeling is interesting, foreign, but entirely welcome.

“Your daiquiri, Ma’am.”

“Thanks, hon.” Helsa doesn’t even look at him as she picks up the martini glass, walking off to join Niffty at the chosen table. She slides into the open chair and pushes Niffty’s drink over to her. “And we’re in business.”

Niffty immediately looks over to find the martini glass sitting in front of her, a beautiful shade of magenta with a dollop of whipped cream on top, and her eye widens a little at the sight as she moves to pick it up. “Oooh! It’s so pretty! No wonder you like going to this place so much.” She moves to take a sip from the straw placed into the drink, and her lips stretch into that bright grin just a couple seconds after. “Wow, ok, I admit, that’s really good. Not _as_ good as some other drinks I’ve had, but still really damn good.”

"And it's pretty cheap too, for some top shelf stuff." She smirks, sipping at her own blue-green concoction. "But, yeah, they really know how to mix stuff over here. I always ask for a lot and can never taste anything."

“Heheh. Well, I’m certainly sold.” She moves to take another sip, her eye flicking out towards the view again, chuckling as she sees a flare of fire in the distance. “It’s a wonder they haven’t burned the forest down with all that dancing.”

"Ah, if they want to, they can. But I'm not replanting anything." She snickers, taking another long sip and eyeing the sparks. After a moment she holds out her drink. "Here, try this. It's just gin and some soda. Sorta minty."

“Minty?” She raises a brow, smirking now. “I’ll be the judge of that.” She moves to take the drink from her hand, giving it a soft sip, and after a moment of smacking her lips, her mouth purses, brow furrowing in contemplation. “..Yup, alright, that’s definitely minty.” She hands it back with a chuckle, moving to hold out her own drink. “Here. You should have a bit of mine. It’s only fair.”

Helsa chuckles, taking her glass, and sips at it. "Mm. Wow. Lots of sugar. Very raspberry, though. Pretty good." She slides it back toward her. "Those things always taste like slushies. It's amazing."

“Hence why I like drinking stuff like this.” She sips at her daiquiri for a moment, draining it a little ways down, before moving to speak again. “To be honest, the first drink I had was actually _beer_.” She shakes her head, propping an elbow on the table and balancing her cheek in it. “Even back then around the 40’s, there’d be parties at colleges and there’d always be someone with some kind of alcohol. I was a bit swamped with work at the time so I decided to go to the little get together just to try and get my mind off of things. First drink of my life at the ripe age of 19, and it was some cheap lukewarm beer out of a bottle.”

"Haha, rookie mistake." Helsa watches as her little cheek marks stretch under the heel of her hand. "My first alcohol didn't come from Earth, honestly. I don't even remember what it was called. Something something...." A strange string of syllables unpronounceable to the human tongue comes out of her mouth, alongside a flare of a second mouth over her jawline. "It was kinda like... well, maybe a rum. Sweet, but stronger."

Niffty’s brow immediately shoots upwards upon hearing the weird alien babble, and for a moment she doesn’t speak. Then that grin of hers only seems to grow, and she points a finger toward her, sharp little claw glinting in the neon lights. “I-Sorry, but did you just grow a second mouth?” She sounds both shocked and also like she’s laughing a touch.

Her eyes widen and the mouth vanishes away in an instant. "Um. Forget you saw that." She rubs her chin, looking aside. "But, yeah, that happens. Everyone in my family can do that. It's, like, a whole thing. Multiple eyes, multiple mouths, shapeshifting. It's normal where we come from."

Niffty nods, still smiling, though she moves to clear her throat with a fist over her mouth in an attempt to shake off her laughter. “Sorry, Sorry. I just..I wasn’t expecting it.” There was a slight pause, and she’s still smiling, lowering her hand. “..I think it’s cool. That you can do that, I mean. Just so you know.”

Helsa relaxes a touch and gulps down more of her drink. "Yeah, thanks." She smiles a little, thinking about that. There's something all too comforting to hear that someone outside her family and outside of social media would tell her something to that effect. "Most people get freaked out by it, you know."

“Really?” She raises her brow, her smile growing a bit wider, crossing her arms, resting them on the table, leaning forward a bit. “I can get why humans would, but if _demons_ get freaked out, then they’re just hypocrites. I mean, I can _spin_ my head around and it even makes a giant cracking noise like I just snapped my neck, and somehow people get freaked out by a little mouth popping up on your jaw?” She tilts her head a touch. “I know it may be a bit odd to say to you, but you know you don’t gotta listen to them, right?”

"Well, yeah, duh. Can't change the fact that I break the rules of physics everywhere I go." She smirks, though she can feel some of the authenticity slipping a little. She takes another sip of her drink. "I can do things most demons can't, and when faced with that reality, it scares people. And I'm _perfectly_ fine with that." She isn't lying on that last bit, though. She'd rather be terrifying than anything else.

“Heh. Yeah, I can imagine.” Niffty’s smile softens a touch, looking almost relieved, and she moves to take a more solid swing of her drink. “It took a while for people to become scared of me. And it’s honestly mostly because of Alastor, though I will admit it’s also because of my job too. Everyone knows that I work for him, and so they know that if I show up, it usually means I’m gonna kill them.” Her tongue flicks out to swipe up a bit of whipped cream. “He actually found me first. He found me working for some horrible lady in a clothing store, and after I fixed up his suit, he took me in.”

Helsa blinks at her, incredulous. All the stories she heard had been those of mystery and deals and puppeteering. Some even thought Niffty had been mind controlled, which is a bit outlandish in Helsa's eyes, especially after meeting her. But the way she phrases it.... "You say that as if Mister 1933 has an ounce of pity in his staticky, out of touch heart."

“Heheheh.” She giggles a bit at that, and her grin turns into that beaming smile again. “Well, maybe he did. He didn’t exactly phrase it as _pity_ , he more phrased it as a job offer because he liked “doing things”, as he put it.” Her hands raise up to crook her fingers in the style of air quotes, before moving to pick up her drink. “Either way, I ended up accepting it.“

"Huh. Kinda sounds like him and his hobbies. Guess he never got bored of you." She props her chin on her hand, narrowing her eyes. "Did he want you as a tailor at first? Since you fixed his suit and all."

“Yup. He also said he liked the fact that I know how to cook and he wanted to bounce ideas off of me whenever he wanted to come up with new recipes.” She rolls her eye a touch. “Of course that didn’t stop me from pulling glass out of his skin or stitching up gashes in his arm whenever he went out for “an evening walk” as he put it.” She shakes her head, as if she’s talking about a rowdy piranha rather than the god damn Radio Demon. “I have nurse’s training too, so that definitely came in handy.”

Helsa snorts at the image of small, little Niffty scolding Alastor after he's had his fun. "What I'm hearing is that you know all the important shit and he just wants to go around killing people and getting a dose of adrenaline here and there."

“More or less, yes.” She chuckles. “I will admit that I like my adrenaline too at times, though, so don’t get me wrong. I can be just as guilty as him. I’m not his _mother_ .” She rolls her eye again. “Hell, I’m _younger_ than him.”

"No, you're just smarter than he is." Helsa takes another sip of her drink. "Hey, if he ever tries to pull some weird magic bullshit on you, just ask me and I'll kick his ankles in.”

“Heheh.” She giggles, as if the idea is the funniest idea in the world to her, and she nods. “I’ll keep that in mind. Should his smile ever go south for the winter, I shall hop and leap into your arms so you may carry me to safety.”

"Pff, right, of course." She smiles, honestly for once, and looks away from the little cyclops at the warm feeling that develops in her stomach. She blames it on the alcohol, of course. "So, you don't want to get drunk, right? What are you like when you do get drunk? I'm curious."

Niffty hums a bit at that, trilling one hand on the table while the other moves to take a sip of her drink, draining it halfway now. “Well, from what Al’s told me in the past, I tend to get very...giggly when I’m drunk. Like I start laughing at everything and I just can’t stop.” She chuckles a touch. “Of course he also tends to get drunk when I’m _already_ drunk so who knows. I could be belching fire left and right and speaking spanish and he wouldn’t be able to tell me which way is up.”

Helsa chuckles at that. "Sounds like you're fun either way." She finishes off her drink and stares at the remaining ice, wondering if she should have a second. "Have you ever gotten drunk here? Or is it usually a sorta stay inside thing?"

“Mm...I usually try and drink more privately for that kinda thing.” She shrugs a touch, grimacing a touch. “I’ve heard plenty of horror stories about popular folk down here throwing up into garbage cans or passing out in gutters and those things spreading all over the web. I’d rather not have that on my Howler feed, you know?”

"Ugh, yeah, that happened to me ages ago. I don't think Howler was around, but people talked about it for _ages_." She rolls her eyes, pouting at the memory. Her brother had made fun of her for weeks afterward. She's never let her tolerance get that low ever again. "I killed a lot of people over that."

“I can imagine, and I bet you those people deserved it.” She moves to down the rest of her drink. “Meanwhile Alastor gets as smashed as he wants but simply doesn’t care because he knows people are too scared of him to say anything. I mean, what are they gonna do? Try to say that the _Radio Demon_ got utterly drunk and passed out in a rose bush?”

"Yeah, actually. There's a lot of funny stories online about it." She pulls out her phone, starting to swipe through her photos. "Apparently one time he went and just... picked all the flowers in some rich person's yard while singing, uh.... 'Ring Around the Rosie'? Some kid put it up on Fumblr a while back."

“What?” Her eye widens and her brow shoots upwards, looking not exactly alarmed but not exactly amused either. “When did this happen? I never heard anything about that at all!”

"I dunno, like... close to a decade ago, I think? Maybe closer to five years." She clicks on a photo and shows it to her. "It was, like, a panic post, but it turned into absolute gold. The dad went out and asked him to leave and he just started singing louder or something."

She moves to lean forward to inspect the photo better, and after a moment of squinting, and she lets out a heavy sigh, moving to sit back down, rubbing over an eye with a hand. “That explains why he came home that night covered in thorns and had one of his arms missing.”

Helsa can't help but laugh at that. "Whoa, that's an addition to the story. He lost an arm? The guy must be insane or something. How'd he even get back home?"

“Apparently the rich guy was one of the Goetia Demons, and a brawl broke out. That’s the only thing he told me.” She shakes her head. “I’m gonna kick his ass if I see him around here.”

"I'll be laughing on the sidelines urging you on." She smirks. "Hey, have you ever been to the lake? Like, at the end of the pier?"

“The lake?” She turns her head to glance towards it, past the dead and blackened trees, glinting with a crimson sheen from the light of the moon. “No, I’ve never gone that far. Have you?”

"Oh, yeah, definitely. I've gone swimming even." Helsa's smile sharpens. "Those rumors about the sharks? Very much true."

“You _swam_ with the sharks?” Her eye widens at that, and her soft frown is replaced with that of a grin. “Holy shit! _How_?”

"Wouldn't you like to know?" She gives her a coy look and brings her glass to her mouth, only to remember that she's out of alcohol. She rolls her eyes and puts it down, then continues smiling. "It's easier than you'd think."

“Oh really?” She raises a dubious brow, though she does smirk right back, placing her chin on a fist as she leans forward. “Is it really that easy to swim with _giant hellfire-breathing sharks_?”

"It really is." Helsa leans in, taking the challenge head on. "Wanna go to the pier and find out?"

“Can you guarantee I won’t get bitten or eaten?” Niffty’s smirk only widens, exposing her teeth.

"Yes, I can." She stands, stretching her arms over her head. "So? How about it? Ready to pet a shark?"

“Hold on.” She moves to toss her empty glass over the railing, standing up on her chair, her smirk turning a bit more cheeky. “3...2...1..”

There was the sound of glass shattering and a scream of pain, and a thud. Niffty chuckles to herself before turning to face her. “Fuck yeah I am.”

•••

"Aaaand the end of the docks! Tada!" Helsa twirls around unsteadily, waving her arms and giggling as she sways a little. There's not that many people this far out, and the boardwalk looks tiny from such a distance. Helsa turns back around to face the lake, bringing a bottle of vodka that she'd snagged from some passerby to her lips. The water stretches out for at least a mile, maybe two. She isn't all too sure. "You should stop by during the day. It's, like, the prettiest thing during the day."

“I can definitely imagine.” Niffty was standing right beside her, looking over the view of the water, as well as the docks just beneath their feet, the wood looking old and forever stained with the deep waterlogged hue that must have been from sitting within the lake for decades, able to see moss growing on the legs of the edge of the pier. The water itself was practically _black_ in hue, the crimson light of the twilight only serving to cast an almost ghastly sheen within the center. She moves to idly sit down on the edge, delicately sticking her feet below the surface, and Helsa can see her whole frame shudder softly. “Whew! It’s kinda really cold!”

“Yeah, that’s usual.” She carefully lowers herself down next to Niffty, stretching her legs out over the lake. Her hair shivers a little and curls, then slumps back to its usual shape as she drops her legs into the water. A little splash follows, but it’s far enough away from Niffty for it to matter much. She hums, closing her eyes and letting her feet sway. “Liquids tend to feel colder than air temperature. This lake is actually colder than it normally would be because of a, uh...” She waves a hand, trying to think of the word, leaning down to stare at the water. “I think you’d call it a permafrost?”

“Permafrost, huh? Geez, how the hell are there _sharks_ in here if it’s this cold?” Niffty moves to lean her elbow on her knee, idly kicking her feet and making the water ripple. “I mean, I’m guessing it’s the fire breath. But still.” She glances towards her, raising a brow. “And you actually swim in this? Do you just not feel it?”

Helsa laughs at that, amused by the question. “I can regulate every bit of my body from temperature to gas intake to hydration. In the simplest terms for this reality, I can piece together and tear apart every atom in my body in exactly the way that I want it to be. I could remove all the alcohol from my body if I wanted to, but where’s the fun in that?” She sways side to side as she speaks. After a moment, she stops and an eye pops open on her cheek arm to peer at Niffty. “And plenty of sharks enjoy colder waters, actually. At least, the ones I’ve read about from Earth.”

“Heheheh.” Niffty can’t help but giggle at the sight of the extra eye, and her feet start to kick a touch harder, just to make more splashing sounds. “That actually sounds really cool. So, by ripping apart your atoms and molding them, you can basically shapeshift into...anything?”

“In the simplest terms, yes. But I’ve gotten comfortable with this look, so...” She shrugs. “I can still, like, change things around to breathe underwater, and, you know, grow fins and whatever when I want. It’s easy.”

“Fins, huh?” She glances Helsa over for a moment, a soft smile still on her lips, before she glances out over the lake. “Well, I’d certainly say you picked a damn good place to try and go swimming if that’s what you aim to do. A black lake flecked with crimson moonlight, filled to the brim with giant sharks. That’s Hell for you.”

“Heheh, yup!” She beams at that, finally opening her eyes. “By the way, there’s a shark coming up on your side.”

Just as she finishes her sentence, a red fin slides out of the water just a few feet away.

Niffty’s eye widens, and she immediately yanks her feet out of the water, crawling back from the edge of the dock. “ _Jesus fuck-!”_

“Hahaha!” Helsa tosses her head back, laughing loudly at her response, and kicks her feet a little in the water. “Don’t worry, that’s just Nerida. She’s a lazy eater. Aren’t you, Nerida?” She chuckles, leaning down as the shark circles around the dock and by her legs.

“..You..You named them, huh?” Niffty slowly loses some of the alarm in her face, and after a moment, she hesitantly shoots closer to peer down into the water, not dipping anything in this time. “How many are in the lake?”

“Hmm....” She brings the bottle of vodka to her lips, trying to remember the number. She starts slipping into the water, glad she’s wearing something more than just a frilly dress this evening. “Something close to twenty. One of them was pregnant last I checked.”

“Twenty, huh? How have they not all..” Niffty glances up to see her slipping into the water, and her eye widens. “..D..Don’t you think you should’ve taken your clothes off first? So they’re not soaking wet?”

Helsa slips in down to her waist and turns around on the pier, smirking widely. “You want me to strip for you?”

Helsa watches as Niffty’s cheeks instantly begin to flush a bright, _bright_ pink, the cute same magenta hue as the raspberry daiquiri she had drank at the Deluxe Manhattan, and Niffty starts stammering to herself, eye darting back and forth from her to the water. “I-I, uh, I-I just meant, well, um..I-I don’t want you to catch a cold is all. From..From your wet clothes. Yeah.”

She watches her, brows raising the longer Niffty goes on, and she snorts, pushing back from the dock and laughing, easily staying afloat in the water. Nerida circles around her. “Don’t worry, don’t worry. You’re fine. But I did just tell you I can change my body on a molecular level to avoid things like that.”

“Oh. Right. Duh.” She clears her throat, a hand lifting to fan her face in a vain effort to chase away the blush. “I..I’m guessing you want me to hop in and join you?”

“If you want to, but it might be a _bit_ cold for a fire demon like you.” She smirks, slipping further back into the lake. “I wouldn’t mind you joining me, though.” 

“Ah. W-Well, um..” The blush actually starts to grow a bit, but it now seems more embarrassed and she raises her voice a touch as Helsa starts to push herself away from the dock. “I’d be _glad_ to, but...I can’t swim.”

“Oh, really?” Helsa blinks, surprised. Under different circumstances, she’d laugh. “There’s supposed to be a boat around here somewhere....” She spins around, looking further into the lake. After a bit of searching through the dark, she spots a small flash of light, followed by the silhouette of a couple in a rowboat. “Ah! There it is. Be right back!”

“Oh, uh, ok!” Niffty is seen nodding, giving a thumbs up and a grin, despite the blush.

Helsa dives under water, the move flawless, making almost no sound at all. A trio of shark fins raise up after her, and a few short moments later, the screams of the couple as the boat is flipped and then promptly tugged over towards the pier. Niffty hears the screaming, the frantic splashing of the couple, before the screams abruptly cut off, and she watches as the boat slowly makes it’s way over to where she sat, the oars somehow not having been knocked out. She can’t help but chuckle at the sight, at the ridiculous notion of Helsa having actually went and _fetched_ her a whole boat to use, and when the boat gets close enough, she moves to step inside, sitting down and gripping the oars with both of her hands. “Ok, now, how do you use these...” She bites her lip for a moment, trying to remember that very brief field trip in Girl Scouts when she was 8, and begins to try and roll the oars through the water, trying to roll them in a backwards circular motion.

Helsa pops up ahead of her. "Heheh. Have you ever rowed a boat before? I haven't myself, so..." She shrugs, swimming back inch by inch as the boat starts moving. Water drips from her hair, her green eyes glowing in the darkness. "I could give you a push to start if you want."

“A-A push may be appreciated.” She flashes a nervous, shy grin, chuckling to herself. “I may have _seen_ someone row a boat once or twice, but that was like...God, I don’t even know how many years ago. I was more the type to study bones and organs instead of forests and rivers and how to operate boats.”

"Well, hey, you're dead now! May as well learn something new with the eternity you've been granted." Helsa swims around the boat and grips the back, setting her feet against the pier and starting to push, gently almost, just to get her moving.

“Hehehe! You..You are very much right. I’d ask for swimming lessons, but something tells me that’s not a good idea in a lake full of sharks.” Niffty giggles to herself, staring across the other side of the boat to Helsa’s face, the tendrils that make up her hair seeming to lose it’s done up pose to fall limp, framing the look of her eyes, glowing that bright, shiny emerald green, quite literally glowing in the dark, and she swore she could see the sight of freckles just below her eyes and lining the bridge of her nose. starting to slowly light up a bright teal blue.

"I can tell them not to hurt you, you know." Helsa pushes off from the dock, dashing up alongside the boat to keep up. "It's an easy thing I can do. But I can't change the temperature of the water."

“Heh. Well, maybe you can teach me to swim some other time.” She moves to start rowing the boat as best she can, and though it’s a bit sloppy at first, she starts to develop a bit of a rhythm that manages to keep her steadily rowing back. She’s able to see the streaks of that same teal blue come upwards every time Helsa kicks her legs, every time her arms come up for another stroke through the water. “And if you ever need to learn how to sew or reset a broken leg, I can return the favor.”

Helsa laughs, the sound bubbling as she dips underwater and reappears further ahead of the little dingy. “Yeah, that might actually come in handy sometime!” She swims further, her hair streamlining behind her and the water rippling in her wakes. She pops up again, further ahead. “Come on! I wanna show you something, but I need deeper water.”

“Heheh! Ok, ok, hold on! I’m rowing as fast as I can! My arms are still short you know!” She laughs to herself despite the talk, moving to start forcing the oars to cut through the water faster, the actions a touch choppy at first, leading the boat to start turning it’s nose to the right for a moment, before she manages to steer it back into place. Her eye was still trained on Helsa’s figure despite knowing she needed to keep an eye on the movements of her hands; she couldn’t help but stare, keenly trying to keep up with the movements of her body as it so seamlessly cut through the water. Like a needle through thread. Like a hot knife through room temperature butter.

“Wider circles! Slower too. You want strength behind the rows, not more of them.” Helsa dips under, spiraling around and appearing a few feet away, then doing it again in the opposite direction. A shark fin raises over the water, joining her side as she continues the odd, almost figure eight movements.

“Oh, uh, right!” A slight flush appears over her cheeks at that, and she moves to do just that, her tongue sticking out of her mouth in concentration as she fights to row the oars properly. “How...do you know...to row these things anyway?!”

“Taught myself!” She slows down, hovering, and watches as the shark circles her. She pets it gently as it gets near her. “Besides, a lake is a perfect place to have absolutely nothing going on. I like nothing. It’s good sometimes.” She jumps over the shark, unsettling its pattern, and starts a little chase, the two of them spinning around each other and making the water bubble with their movements. Helsa stays close to the surface, so Niffty can watch.

Niffty finally gets close enough to see the full spectacle, to see the shark’s figure within the water, it’s almost obnoxiously bright blue scales, it’s grey underbelly with gills that seemed to glow with flame, and as it’s tail whipped through the water, she caught sight of it’s eyes, bright red, and lacking of any pupils. Even then, the shark didn’t seem to be looking to snap it’s jaws, didn’t seem eager to bite, and it was enough to get Niffty to stare, her eye wide, her breath catching ever so slightly in her throat. “..Do you have a name for this one?”

Helsa finishes another spin, jettisoning out of the water until the soles of her shoes showed. Fins flare out from her lower legs and forearms, the same dark bluish grey as the rest of her skin. There’s a split second where the two of them are staring at each other, Helsa all but floating over the water, and then she slips, dipping a little before resurfacing again with a giggle. “His name’s Cookie.”

There was a few seconds where there was nothing but silence on Niffty’s end, before her smile broke over the silence with a giggle, and she moves to kneel by the very side of the boat, leaning over a touch to keep more direct eye contact, casually crossing her arms over the boat’s edge. “Y-You named him _Cookie_?”

“Hey, he likes it!” She splashes water toward her, letting the boat come closer and pulling her arms onto the side. “Besides, he’s the most friendly one here. The others have their nippy days. Cookie doesn’t.”

“Ahh!” She ducks a touch to avoid the splash, though she chuckles as she watches Helsa also move to grab onto the boat, shifting her head to the left to glance at her. “Ohhh, I get it. You named him that because he’s a sweetie. Aww, that’s cute. Does his skin feel funny? I read somewhere that sharks tend to have skin like sandpaper.”

“It’s a bit rough, if that’s what you mean, but it’s not too bad. I’ve never felt sandpaper before, though.” Helsa watches her, admiring the grin on her face. It’s probably the alcohol talking, at least, that’s what she tells herself, but for a pyromancer, Niffty looks good in the moonlight. She smirks and pushes back from the boat. “I’ll show you something neat, though. Ever seen aerial acrobatics?”

“Like, tricks in the air?” She raises a brow, still smiling. “Can’t say I’ve ever seen it done with sharks.”

“Then you’ll be seeing something new today.” Helsa smirks, swimming a bit further away. “Just keep on watching.”

She dives under the surface, circling below the surface for a moment before vaulting into the air, tucking into a ball and stretching out again to break the surface with her feet. She slides smoothly into the water, does a few spins, and leaps out again, this time breaking into a leisurely pose, as if she were on a lounging chair, and winks at Niffty.

The sight of Helsa breaking in and out of the water is enough to leave Niffty speechless, watching with a wide eye as she continues to soar in and out of the water, again and again able to take in the sight of the fins that line her legs, her arms. She watches the water as she breaches the surface to reach into the air, almost seeming to reach out to keep in contact with her skin as droplets rise upwards with her, sparkling in the crimson light of the moon. She watches the way her tendrils, long and slim and looking so strong despite their thin frame, dip and sway to the rush of the air as she momentarily hangs in the silhouette of the pentagram in the sky, mere seconds before her body starts to descend back down, and all the while they’re staring at each other. Those eyes meeting her own. Warm and smug and _glowing_ in a way that was so different from the constant haze of pinks, reds, and blacks. Green always felt like such a rare color down here.

On the next jump, Helsa merely twirls upward, spinning as she pirouettes into the sky, and then there are sharks, from every direction, leaping out in arches under her, some high enough to pass in front of her and block Niffty’s view. Helsa tips back at the top of her arch, diving back into the water. There’s a moment of nothing, and then a ring of water rises from the lake, wobbling like a gentle stream. A shark leaps up, just barely scraping through the hoop, and then another. The third spits out fire as it makes it through, wiggling happily before bellyflopping into the water.

The impacts from the sharks all crashing against the water is enough to make the boat rock a little, bobbing back and forth in the ripples and waves that were created, but Niffty doesn’t even care, feeling herself start to laugh, fits of giggling slipping past her lips at the sheer ridiculousness of it all. She’s quick to light up her fingers with a snap, spawning a small flicker of flame, then another in her other hand, before slowly bringing both of the flames together, briefly cupping it into both hands before throwing it into the air out in front of her. At first it merely goes to plummet, until Niffty reaches out both hands, and the bundle of flame stops, slowly lifting it into the air, right where the water hoop had been. After a moment, she slowly sticks up both of her index fingers, closing her other fingers into a fist, before starting to twirl her fingers in a circular motion. A ring of flames, much like the one made from the water, appears above the surface, and Niffty lets out a giggle, eager to see what happens.

There’s a short moment of nothing, and then Helsa comes rocketing out, bolting through the ring and whooping in victory. She spins on the exit, spreading her arms out to land on her back in a rather similar fashion as that last shark. She splashes into the water, her hair trailing up as she sinks.

“Haha!” Niffty releases her concentration on the fire ring in order to start clapping, letting her laughter ring throughout the air as the flames quickly fade into nothing but ashes. She leans over on the boat in an attempt to seek her out beneath the surface, still grinning. “Got any other fun tricks up your sleeve?”

She slides up to the boat, grinning widely, and pulls herself up beside Niffty. “Oh, sure. But a master never shows all her cards on the first night.” She rests her chin on her arms. “Seems like you’ll have to come back for night two.”

“Heh. Oh yeah? That’s a shame.” She snaps her fingers to show off a flame, smirking at her now, eye half-lidded. “I wanted to get a chance to show off some of my own tricks.”

“We can arrange that, I’m sure.” Her grin widens, eyes narrowing on her. “Despite what my image may say, I _am_ capable of giving up the spotlight here and there.”

“Heheh. Somehow I don’t doubt that. After all, isn’t _this_ technically sharing a bit of the spotlight?” She closes her hand to snuff out the flames, gesturing at the now quiet lake surface.

Helsa chuckles lightly, watching her. “You have quite a way with words, Firebug. Anyone ever tell you that? _Quite_ a way with words.”

She seems to snicker to herself at that, leaning a cheek in her hand, resting her elbow on her knee. “Heheheh. Thanks. I dunno if it’s my own charm as a nurse or if some of Alastor’s quirks stuck with me, but I’m glad to hear you think I got a silver tongue.” She playfully sticks it out for a moment before sliding it back in her mouth. “Has anyone ever told _you_ that you’re really fun to hang out with? And you have a nice smile?”

“Oh, really?” She smiles, though it’s tinged with something that isn’t particularly happy. “I suppose I’ve heard it once or twice before. I mean, who _wouldn’t_ think I’m fun after all of this?”

“Heh. Idiots, probably.” She lets out another idle chuckle. “And since I’m no idiot, I’m gonna say it again, just to make sure you know.” She smiles at her, softly. “I think you’re really fun to hang out with, Helsa.” Her cheeks softly flush a touch. “And I think you have a wonderful smile.”

As soon as Niffty’s expression softens, Helsa feels a blush dust over her face which only worsens with the words Niffty follows it up with. She isn’t sure how to respond to that, or the cute flare across Niffty’s face, or the way she barely feels like she’s swimming in water any more. “Uh, well, I...” Helsa finally breaks eye contact with her, her shoulders tightening. A small frown pulls her lips down and she lets the water pull her up and set her in the boat. She settles sideways in the boat, avoiding Niffty’s gaze. “Can I tell you something?”

There was silence for a moment, before there’s the sound of Niffty shifting in the boat, probably to face her back. “..Y-Yeah. Of course.”

She sinks for a moment, not a bit of her to be seen over the lip of the boat. “No one’s... ever actually told me that. That I’m fun to hang around, or that I have a nice smile.” She pushes one of her tendrils out of her face. “I’ve always been the one having to say it.”

“...What?” She sounds confused, at first, her voice a soft whisper. “..How could you never hear something like that? I mean, the nice smile thing, I can sorta see? It’s a bit of a...strange compliment, sure, but, how have none of your friends told you that you’re fun to be around?”

“You mean the _’friends’_ who stand beside me for selfies and to climb the social ladder, but refuse to associate with me on their own time?” Helsa rolls her eyes. “Don’t get me started on compliments. Apparently they’re not _Eldritchian_ enough to be acceptable in the Eldritch household. _It’s a sign of weakness, Helsa. Compliments are for mortals, Helsa._ Ugh, I hate my family.” She stretches out again, thunking her head back against the side of the boat and letting her ankles show over the edge of the boat.

“...Your parents said that to you?” She sounds a touch shocked, almost revolted. “Why? Why would they ever say anything like that to you?”

“Because they’re worried about the _‘impact of mortals on their progeny.’_ ” She waves a hand out, her hair bristling. “They want us to be these cookie cutter copies of them _all_ because they cut off a limb and wanted kids. _Newsflash_! You can’t control Eldritches.”

She’s silent for a moment, before her voice is heard again, and it’s a touch softer than before. “..Is that why you’re out here?” There was a pause of silence. “...You’re out here because you’re avoiding your parents?”

Helsa doesn’t answer at first, and by the time she realizes she’s thinking of excuses, she realizes her silence is an answer enough. She straightens a little, pouting. “Okay, look, my parents are assholes. But they’re, like, ancient - dusty ancient, y’know - and they’re not even from this dimension. _I’m_ not from this dimension, but this is where I’ve spent most of my life. So things are weird. I’ve grown up with the rules that govern this sphere, and they grew up and destroyed and/or ate dozens of other spheres. But they really cling onto their home dimension for whatever reason, all its culture and shit. Even though we’re beings that _transcend_ culture and rules and shit. So it’s complicated. But, yeah, they’re assholes and I hate them.”

“...And that’s why you like being out here, then..” There's the sensation of something idly pressing up against her back, and when she risks shifting her head over for a glance, she sees Niffty leaning against her ever so slightly, facing away, her knees pulled up to her chest as she looks up toward the sky. “...And you said you don’t have any friends either. That they’re all just...fakes.”

“As fake as I am.” Helsa huffs, following her gaze up to the sky. “It doesn’t matter anyways. Some day, I’ll leave all this behind. Figure out how to properly move through dimensions. I can’t exactly be _killed_ either. So I’ll outlive _everyone_. Even Lucifer.” She exhales.

“...Leave this all behind, huh?” She’s quiet for a moment. “..I wouldn’t blame you. If I could do the same, I probably would. Go back up and see Earth and everything. See how it’s changed.” There was another pause. “..And...for the record..I don’t think you’re fake at all.”

She laughs at that, pointing at her sloppily. “This is only coming out because I get sad drunk without enough... stuff to do. Or when it’s wearing off.” She drops her head against the boat again. “I wanna see Earth some day.”

“Just because you’re good at hiding things doesn’t mean you’re fake.” After there was no response, Niffty lets out a soft sigh, and Helsa slowly feels a hand move to slide over her own, not squeezing, not holding, simply resting there. “..Anything about it you want to know?”

“I...” She feels her eyes burn for a moment as the obvious query comes to mind. “I wanna know what sunlight feels like.”

There was another pause, and slowly, the hand covering her own slips away. Helsa feels the burning in her eyes only get worse for a moment, and her chest tightens in a way that makes it feel like it’s being filled with shards of glass, but seconds before she can do anything, she hears the sound of a crackle of flame, and feels a wash of heat slide over her back. Niffty’s voice speaks up again, softly. “...It...It’s not..exactly sunlight, but..it’s the best I can do.”

“Heh...” Helsa hastily covers up a sniffle, closing her eyes and clenching her fists to refuse the tears that want to flow. She takes in the feel of fire. “Thanks, Niffty.”

“..No problem.” 

The fire continues to crackle for a moment, silently, the warmth slowly filling the air, never once straying from her back. Helsa idly wondered if the sun sounded like that. Like a crackling flame above the heads of mortals. She certainly hoped it _felt_ this nice. 

Niffty’s voice spoke up again, softly. “..Do you want to leave? Go somewhere else for the night? I...I have a spare room in my house, if you want to sleep there.”

She cracks an eye open, glancing down at Niffty. “I don’t know if I should-”

The ship jerks for a moment, then steadily starts moving through the water.

“Aah-!” Niffty can’t help but yelp as she wobbles from the sudden jolt to the boat, the flames in her hands sparking before extinguishing as she pulls them apart from each other to grab the sides of the boat’s rim, stopping herself from falling. She glances toward the oars, the ones that were dead still within their holders, and she feels a bit of the color drain itself from her face. “H..Helsa? Are you..doing that?”

Helsa rolls her eyes, crossing her arms. “ _No_ . It’s probably my brother, come to collect me. Lord _Dweeb of the Cosmos!_ ” At that, she snaps up, grabbing the edge of the boat facing the docks. Her hair writhes, eyes glowing a heinous green. “ _Fuck off!_ ”

At the end of the docks stood a figure dressed in what appeared to be that of a fancy suit, who had his arms folded in an unimpressed glare, his eyes colored green with a bright crimson sclera, his top hat displaying several pairs of eyes and a row of teeth lining the brim. He takes a moment to roll his eyes, and he lets out a sigh before shaking his head. “Helsa, what have I told you about sneaking out in the middle of the night to pollute your body with the vices of mortals? Mother and Father have warned you about this habit of yours, you know that. I can’t keep going out to track you down like this.”

"Then don't! I never asked you to anyways." She grumbles, then stops and laughs. "Hey, you should try it! I left my bottle on the dock for ya!"

His eyes narrow with distaste. “You mean this?” He turns away from the boat and reaches out with a foot, kicking the bottle of vodka into the water.

"Ugh." She deflates against he side of the boat. "Fucking jerk." She glowers at him, then decidedly turns away, hugging herself. She lowers her voice so her brother won't hear. "Time to start mentally preparing myself or all the shitty takes this guy has hidden up his sleeve."

“Helsa...Why is there a mortal in the boat with you?” Seviathan’s voice is heard again as the boat finally reaches the docks, and his eyes narrow in a soft glare. 

Niffty seems to freeze for a moment, before she slowly takes a breath and hops up from the boat to the docks. She glares up at Seviathan with a stern gaze, her hands on her hips. “The name is _Niffty_ , thank you very much.”

He doesn’t speak for a moment, but the glare in his eyes seems to lessen, and he hums softly. “Oh, of course. The _Firebug_. Tch. Your master wouldn’t happen to be here as well, would he? I’d hate to have to look such barbarism in the face, lest I get the urge to vomit.” 

“No, he isn’t. And I doubt he’d want to look _you_ in the face either.” Her eye narrows softly, lip curled back in an idle snarl.

"I doubt many people would." Helsa clambers out of the boat and onto the dock, wobbling a little as she gets used to dry land. Her fins had already shrunk away in the boat. She crosses her arms and glares at her brother, raising a brow. "I wanted to show her the wildlife. And, for your information, Seviathan, I've been having a lovely time here. You can leave."

“I’m not leaving until you agree to come with me, Helsa. You need to sober up and come home before Mother and Father know that you left again.” His gaze turns to her, and he narrows his eyes. “You can’t keep running away and getting yourself inebriated to the point of sickness every time our parents get upset with you.”

"Right, yeah, _upset_ was what they were." She puts a hand on her hip, unimpressed. "If they really had such a pressing need to yell at me over the smallest of things, they'd have come here themselves."

“The _point_ , Helsa, is that every time you try to squabble with them, I find you somewhere out in Hell either too drunk to stand or completely passed out, and I’m here to take you back before you can get to that point.” He steps closer, raising a finger to poke at her chest. “I won’t ask again. Sober up right now, we’re going home.”

She doesn't even blink before a torrent of water splashes him in the face, knocking his hat askew and making him stumble back. "No. I like being drunk. And, Sev?" She walks up to him, putting her face in his. "Keep your hands off." She walks around him and toward the boardwalk.

“ _Gah-_ !” Seviathan feels back from the sudden splash, coughing and wiping at his face frantically, head whipping toward the surface of the lake to see one of the sharks glaring at him, it’s red eye narrowed into a slit of utter malice. Niffty herself stifles a snort, her hands clasping her mouth in an attempt to hide the sound, her eye going wide as soon as Seviathan’s gaze snaps to her. There was a tense silence for a moment, before he moves to adjust his hat, teeth bared in a snarl. “Keep away from my sister, you cannibalistic _filth_ .” He turns around and starts to stalk after Helsa, his suit already completely clean and absent of any water. “Helsa! _Helsa_ , get back here! You are _not_ going back to that _cesspool_ , you hear me?”

"You can't make me do or not do anything, Seviathan."

"Helsa!"

"Saying my name over and over isn't going to do anything. Just leave me alone to get smashed."

"Helsa, no, you need to come home."

"And we're back to you not being able to make me do anything. Go back home and lick some boots."

Niffty couldn’t help but wince at the two of them, watching as Helsa stubbornly walked away, and as her brother chased after her. She wanted to give chase herself, wanted to convince Seviathan to leave Helsa alone, but she didn’t know how to begin to do such a thing, let alone actually succeed. She didn’t think she’d be able to anyway. Something told her that her opinions on the whole matter wouldn’t exactly be taken into proper regard. She clenches her hands into fists at her sides, before letting out a heavy sigh, crossing her arms as she begins to walk off the docks as well. 

She didn’t especially feel like partying anymore.

•••

“Fucking-!” Helsa tosses her gaming headset away from her, kicking her legs out and letting her chair rock back and forth. The widescreen television in front of her that she stole from some store ages ago flickers off. “Ugh.” Her arms go limp beside her, her controller fumbling away and onto the rug beneath her. She’s not angry at the game, or the gamer who had gotten her with a second of her spawning (though, honestly, cheap shot). She wants to blame them, but she knows it’s ridiculous to do so. Her gaming chair rocks a bit longer before coming to halt, and she grabs her phone from a pocket on the side, skimming through notifications. Lots of likes, some weird comments, a few creepy DMs. She flicks them away, standing up and starting to crawl through the internet, flicking through the infinite abyss demons call scrolling.

She first checked up on Howler, and already she could feel her lip curl up a bit in a grimace at the sight of many photos, all of them having some strange distortion or visually creepy component, displaying her and Niffty walking side by side together on the boardwalk, chatting together with their drinks at the table of the _Deluxe Manhattan_ , even a few spotting the two of them slowly walking their way down towards the lake, trekking through the tall grass and away from the bright neon lights of the _Jagged Rock_. She could feel her tendrils quivering with anger, with a sort of sloppy irritation that still had yet to go away (she wasn’t tipsy anymore but she wanted to keep a little buzz still in her system), and it was enough to get one of her mouths on her jawline to open in a faint snarl. She lifts a hand to press against her jaw to try and force it back shut again, and her thoughts drift to Niffty’s soft words of praise when she had seen that mouth split open, and her cheeks feel a soft warmth flare up within them. It’s enough to make her sigh, and she moves to collapse on her bed, stomach first, reaching up to remove the hair-tie, her tendrils all slowly falling away to lie limp, a few strands falling over one of her eyes, the rest twitching and slithering about in mindless fashions.

She huffs for a moment, not wanting to look any further, but she can't help continuing to scroll, zooming past the photos and videos of her drunkenly shambling with someone of such notability. There's the usual news, someone making a fool of themselves on live television, another block burnt down in center city, someone breaking into Sir Pentious's airship for the umpteenth time only to end up as a stain of ashes on the sidewalk. Helsa still comes up within the feed. She huffs and switches to her Fumblr accounts. Maybe something less news-centric would be better for her.

She flicks onto her dashboard, and begins to scroll, idly passing by the Vox-bots that pester her for likes and the porn bots that send unwanted pictures of nudes in order to solicit sex, making sure to click those ones off of her page with a bit more venom than she usually would. She pauses to glance at her inbox, finding that it was full of nothing but random people trying to hop into her DM’s for a chance at popularity, and it was enough to make her lips curl into a snarl. There are also occasional blogs that post pictures of strange sightings in Hell (some seem to have gotten glimpses of the Whip Wraith walking around somewhere around a city by the name of Lava Lagoon), and there are others that seem to be more centered around magic and to teach demons about all sorts of spells, and after a moment, she passes by a blog that catches her eye. The picture displayed in the profile appeared to be a singular orange eyeball, contrasted off a black background, and the label was deceptively simple: _Firebug_.

Helsa debates with herself on whether or not to click on it, though she does raise herself on her elbows in interest. There's no reason for her to look at Niffty's account. None. But there's also no reason for her to _not_ look. She could even find something interesting about the little thing, or possibly even the Radio Demon. She trills her nails against the case of her phone, then hunkers down again, clicking on the Firebug's blog and starting to skim through posts. At first there was nothing more than simple pictures of what looked to be various different objects, from dainty-looking pillows and giant blankets to full on outfits, ranging from jackets to sweaters to hoodies, pants, shirts and skirts, and it’s only when Helsa spots the picture of what looks to be a pretty headband with a glittery flower glued onto it that she lets her eyes flick down to the caption: _Only completed this in about two days!_ It was enough to get her to blink, and she feels her jaw drop a bit. “Holy shit, she _makes_ this stuff..?”

She scans through some of the earlier posts, glancing at dates and looking for any indicator of how long it took her. It's rarely longer than a week or two, and most of those are complex works with multiple pieces. There's even more the further she goes in, and then she notices a few fandom-y bits here and there. Little headcanons and ficlets for some of Hell's current and more established writers. Helsa doesn't bother reading it. Maybe some other time, but she doesn't need to read anything extensive at the moment. Some are rather long. _Ridiculously_ long. She's almost impressed by it.

She scrolls down a bit further, only to find a video, and she moves to click on it, seeing it open up with Niffty flashing that wide, happy smile of hers, looking to be standing in a completely new location than what she had seen in the cooking videos, something that looks more like a bedroom. She moves to wave at the camera, moving to speak, and that’s when Helsa realizes the audio is coming out through her phone’s speakers, and not her earbuds. She grumbles softly to herself, briefly tapping her thumb against the screen to pause it as she lifts her head off the bed to glance over her secret room, frowning softly. “Earbuds, earbuds, earbuds...” She glances at her bedside table, finding it empty, and then over at her gaming station, also empty. Her eyes glance down to the bluetooth gaming headset, left haphazardly on the ground a few feet away from her seat. She probably threw her earbuds off onto her other bed before coming in here. Sighing, she trudges over the headset and brings it back to the bed, moving this time to sit upright. She swipes to her bluetooth settings, puts the phone against the headset, and waits a moment for them to synch before putting the headset on.

She moves to click back on the video, and this time Niffty’s voice comes out through the headset’s speakers, and though she sounds jolly, Helsa can tell it’s a bit more performative than her normal voice. “ _Hello, everyone! Glad to see you could join me again! I hope everyone’s projects on my last video went well! I would love to see what you made down in the reblog section, and don’t be shy if it’s still in progress or if you’re still starting off. Practice makes perfect, as they say!”_ She flashes a smile towards the camera and briefly moves to pick up a sewing needle and thread, moving to hold it in front of the camera with a grin. “ _Now, I should warn you that sewing clothes is a much more timely and considerable task than things like pillows or stuffed decorations, so you should only try to attempt such when you feel like you’re ready. But I don’t mind showing you the process, if you’re really nervous and feel like you need the help!_ ”

“....Huh.” Helsa hadn’t thought about it before, but, if she didn’t know Niffty personally, she wouldn’t have been able to see through the fake smile she put on for the camera. Which means she’s decently good at _acting_. She could easily become some kind of trendsetter star or occasional guest star for certain reality shows. It was enough to get her to frown a touch, and she can’t help but think back on that one video of the Radio Demon interrupting her during one of her videos, and how it ended up being posted anyway. She recalls the way Niffty has stiffened a bit, had literally frozen in place when she had criticized him on staying within his rigid ways, and she feels her stomach twist into a knot, feels her blood momentarily chill, as if a sliver of ice was sliding around in her frame. She didn’t know enough about him to know for sure, but she knew how much he loathed modern tech. How much he hated it and sometimes went and knocked down entire power grids, as if wanting to rip the Internet away from everyone in the city. And if he found out that one of his best minions was so heavily participating in something he loathed.

Before she really knows what she’s doing, she writing a private message to Niffty’s account, writing things like, _Why haven’t you gone big with this stuff? There’s no way you wouldn’t make it either online or on television. Does it have anything to do with the Radio Demon??_ And then she stops, remembering who she’s talking to, who she herself is, what her person is supposed to be. She shouldn’t be so concerned. This is _Hell_ . Other people’s personal lives aren’t any of her business, especially when she herself goes out of her way to make people’s lives worse. Her thumb hovers over the keyboard, hesitating, and then she deletes everything. No. No, she shouldn’t say anything. She bites her lip, frowning. But she _should_ , shouldn’t she? Niffty had asked her a few times about if she was alright, back when she had been drunk. It’s only fair she does the same. But would Niffty want to hear any of it? It could be personal, or she may not want to talk about it, or she may get offended, or a whole litany of other things. Maybe... maybe just start out slow? Try and be casual? Helsa takes a deep breath. Yeah, that sounds better. She starts typing again.

_Hey, I saw some of your posts on here. Why don’t you try and go big with this stuff?_

She stares at it. No. Too blunt.

_Wow, I saw some of your posts on here! You sew a lot omg. I could see this stuff as a whole entire brand tbh._

Hmm... Too much? Too much.

_Wow, I saw some of your sewing posts on here! Have you ever thought about going professional??_

Yeah, that extra question mark really livens things up. She reads it over a few more times and hits send.

She immediately places the phone face down on the bed, rubbing over her face with her hands, her tendrils twitching and writhing softly, no doubt sensing her turbulent emotions, how much her stomach twisted at the sheer thought of Niffty being trapped like that, being confined and restrained and _forced_ to act and behave in ways that she didn’t want to. It was close, it was too close, and she didn’t want it wished on _anyone_ , least of all _Niffty_ , least of all her. That ball of flame and bright smiles that tried to make her laugh with jokes, tried to provide her with good clothes that wouldn’t fall to pieces and a ring of her own flames to jump through, the very same demon, the very same _mortal_ that tried to give her the best of what she could offer, tried her damndest to give her the gift of what it felt like to have the sun shining down on her back. It was enough to make her heart _clench_ in her chest. 

The notification dings, and Helsa scrambles to lift the screen up to her eyes. 

_-Oh, uh, hi! Yeah, I’ve considered it once or twice, but I kinda think doing it professionally would be too much of a task. Can’t go about making everything all on my own, what with my other jobs, and if I went about making hiring people to make my stuff for me, then I’d miss being able to do it myself. Don’t worry though, I got a commissions page open here and there, whenever I feel like having some cash to myself. | )_

Another soft ding. 

_-Again, that was a wink._

Helsa stares at the initial block of text, then softens a little and rolls her eyes at the comment about her use of text based emoticons. Silly little thing. She rereads the first response, frowning lightly. So her _jobs_ are holding her back, which could easily translate into the Radio Demon pulling his strings. And what did that last bit mean? Having some cash to herself? She taps her phone case, thinking for a moment. She had to be careful with this. Slow. Calm.

_Oh, yeah, that makes sense! The commissions stuff. I got the wink, though. You really don’t think you could go professional though? Maybe you could drop one of your jobs to make time?_

The text came in a couple seconds later. 

_-Drop one of my jobs? I don’t think I can do that. I mean, my jobs mostly consist of helping out Alastor with whatever he needs. Stitching up his clothes, tracking down demons he has beef with, taking care of his ass if he gets hurt, yadda yadda. The blogs and everything_ could _count as another job, I suppose, but I mostly do them for fun._

Ahh. She tries to keep the internal panic to a minimum. She takes a deep breath, pushing her hair back. _Oh, okay, yeah. I’ve just been noticing a lot of people making a move toward doing their hobbies more than their day job and all. Do you really have to take care of Alastor that much?_

 _-Well, I don’t do it_ every _day. Usually he just ends up teleporting me to wherever he is when he needs me. It was a bit spooky at first but I got used to it._

Helsa blinks at that. _Without even asking first?_ She doesn’t even hesitate on asking that. The number of wards she’d had to put on this room alone to keep her family from doing the same to her is too many to remember off hand. Her skin prickles as she realizes that _the Radio Demon_ likely isn’t using a simple form of teleportation, but rather something akin to spacial manipulation with some added twists to it. Fucking Hell. The man really does have some terrifying abilities, doesn’t he?

 _-Well, not at_ first, _no. But after the second time he did it, I asked him to at least try to warn me first before he did it, and he agreed. Now he sends me a quick telepathy kind of thing to make sure I’m ready before slingshotting me across the city._

Well. That’s better than nothing, but... _Okay. But, do you do all that stuff for him because he makes you, or do you actually want to do that stuff? I can never tell with humans/demons, but I do know about power dynamics._

There was silence for a few moments. 

_-I...I mean, I_ do _want to. But he also kind of owns my soul? Or at least, like, he owns the tether. I made a deal with him, Helsa. I can’t exactly break that. The demons I kill are ones that try to break deals he’s made with them. Same thing with Valentino and him shooting his goons between the eyes. Once you make a tether with someone that strong, you’re bound for your whole afterlife._

Helsa starts typing something out, starts writing something she isn’t entirely sure of but has definitely seen happen and knows is possible. She swallows, her hands shaking a little, and rereads the text. She reads it again. She hits send. _I can remove that tether if you want._

There was a long, long pause. 

_I appreciate the offer, but I’m ok. Trust me. I don’t mind doing this. Being like this. I know Alastor doesn’t seem like he’s great, but he’s honestly much better than you’d think. He isn’t like most of the assholes down here, you know?_

_Are you sure? I mean, obviously I don’t know the guy, but I’m fairly certain having your soul owned by someone else is not a very fun thing for you humans._ She frowns for a moment, then adds, _And not being like most other assholes doesn’t make him a saint. I’ve listened to his broadcasts here and there. He’s pretty good at manipulating stories._

 _-And he_ likes _being seen as terrifying. It’s fun to him, and so when he wants to put on a show, he’ll damn well do it. It’s only when the show is over does he drop the terrifying act. He has no reason to hold up an act when he’s around me and no one else. I’ve known him for decades now._

_He’s a master manipulator though! How can you know for sure? It could be that one moment he’s teleporting you around for his injuries or whatever, and then the next he’s doing it to use you as a social prop. What if he starts telling you to not use social media or stop taking commissions or something??_

There was another pause. A slightly longer one. 

_-...Helsa, are you ok?_

She goes still, staring at the screen, wondering what the question means while not feeling completely within her body. Well, maybe more like her body is morphing without her entirely thinking of it, but same thing. She swallows, feeling her face heat up as some part of her that she refuses to acknowledge takes the statement as something worth acknowledging. _Of course I am. I’m perfectly fine. This isn’t about me. This is about you._

The texting bubble appears and disappears for a few moments, before it finally comes through. 

_-I’m not constantly at Alastor’s side, Helsa. I have my own life, I have my own house, with my own hobbies. Alastor doesn’t like modern tech, yes, but he knows that it’s his choice to not move forward, and that it’s my choice to use it as I want to. I help him because I technically have to, yes. But he offered me a job with him when I first met him, and it was a job I accepted of my own volition. I chose to shake his hand, and by now, I think it’s safe to say that he respects me as a person and as a friend, not as a tool or as a minion to knock around._

There was another pause. 

_But I’m thankful for your concern. I really am. I understand why’d you think that way about him, and I’m here to tell you that you have nothing to fear. It’s ok, Helsa. I’m ok. Take a deep breath._

Helsa takes the advice. She drops the phone onto the bed below her and rubs her face, feeling how her hands are shaking. This was all stupid. Just... she shouldn’t have said anything. She’s just making something out of nothing. And now Niffty has seen her act weird and strange and not right. She pulls her legs up to her chin and presses her face into her knees, taking another breath.

There was another buzz from her phone, and when she doesn’t answer it immediately, there’s another. 

_-Are you alright?_

_-Do you need something to help you calm down?_

She swipes her phone back up at the second notification, relaxing a little bit and feeling her energy tank as she reads and rereads the messages. She flops down on the bed on her side. _No, I’m fine._ It sounds too blunt, could be taken as sharp or curt or whatever, but... She doesn’t have the energy for more at the moment. Her skin is still settling from the panic.

Another ding. 

_-Are you sure? I have music, if you’d want that. Music helps me calm down when I need to._

Helsa takes another deep breath. She does have her headphones on her. Maybe... Maybe that would be a good idea. Music. Some calming music. She still hesitates when typing. _Yeah, sure. What do you got?_

_Well, I have a lot of indie music, a lot of instrumental music, guitar music, that sort of thing. Hmmm...Hold on a second._

There was a slight pause before a link pops up in the message. It was a song linked to the Spookify app.

Helsa eyes the link, not clicking it for a moment, and then sighs and shifts onto her back, fixing her headphones over her head. "This better be good." She clicks on the link, bypasses some extra pages and advertisements, and lets the audio start to play. A guitar strums, simple, alone, gentle.

_"Oh, how it must feel to be a bird..."_

Hmm. Yeah. Freedom is nice. She rolls her eyes.

_"Roamin' lonely over sea air..."_

She stiffens slightly, glancing at her phone now resting on her chest. The last time she had seen an ocean had been.... Gods, all too long, evidently. She knows plenty about how humans considered them in stories, though. Enough to understand the reference to... hm. Journeys? Turbulent moments in life? The price of freedom? The things people don't think about? Don't want to think about? The singer's voice is smooth and comforting, sad but nostalgic. Bittersweet.

“ _How it must feel to be a bird..._ _London, Paris, underneath...”_

London. London. That sounded familiar. So did Paris. Was London a part of Paris? Or was it the other way around. She bit her lip a bit, and she furrows her brow slightly, even as she feels the backing chorus slowly creep up above the soft strumming of the guitar to echo in her ears. Those were places on Earth. She knew that much. She knew they were large places, cities, continents maybe? Very popular. 

“ _And I couldn't tell you enough that I'm sorry..._ _And no, you couldn't tell me enough that you love me...”_

She feels the voice of the singer suddenly rise in a loud, almost mournful tone, and it almost ripples down her spine. Something in her breath catches.

Helsa shifts onto her side, swallowing as the song continues.

" _But she's bringing the moon and stars to me, damn permanent reverie."_

An upswing in the tone, percussion joining the hums and vocals. Something about it makes her fists clench over her phone. Maybe the talk of the stars? She's seen them before, but not Earth's stars.

" _And though this life, the love is brief, I've got people to carry me."_

More hopeful. Right. Like there's anyone who'd even think to "carry" her. She doesn't understand the concept of a short life. Not really. All she knows is the concept of ending one, much similar to how a demon would squash a bug under their shoe.

“ _Wasn't it love as soon as we knew each other properly?_ _Livin' 'bout half right 'til a certain person got to me.”_

Half right. That sounded too accurate. The only thing that was more accurate was saying her life was “nowhere near right”, but that didn’t flow so well with the song’s tempo. She feels her hands tighten over her phone a bit more.

“ _Nothin' is secret, everythin's sacred, how it ought to be._ _Under the moonlight on a clear night, o_ _n rooftops is where I want to be.”_

Her mind flashes back to watching Niffty’s smiling face as she sips at her drink atop the _Deluxe Manhattan_ , the moon cast overhead, and how everything felt so...nice in that moment, so calm. So causal. Normal. She couldn’t help but wish she was still there.

_"Sometimes, I act like a child, that's something I can't release."_

If she had a heart (she could make herself one) she'd feel it twinge in pain at the words. Her skin merely shivers, tightening into an unwelcome, bristly, almost cactus like texture. The song fades out for a moment as she curls into a tighter ball, recalling every petulant, moody, irresponsible thing she's done to stick it to her parents, to keep up this facade of popular bullshit that props up her smile and accentuates her growls rather than let any weaker emotions show through. Something she... had let slip with Niffty.

"... _In a full room, I'm the only one she's smiling at!"_

That image of Niffty, in front of her at the bar, in the little raft, smiling and laughing... She feels her eyes sting and her lips twitch up in a smile.

” _But truthfully, if you ever go, yo_ _u'll drop me straight to Hell, the 7th circle...”_

The irony in that phrase makes a soft, bitter chuckle fall from her lips, and she feels her eyes sting a bit more. It would be kind of funny if this place wasn’t actually Hell, wouldn’t it?

“ _And I was talkin' with you earlier._ _We were open and vulnerable; it was wonderful.”_

The feeling of Niffty’s back resting against her own. The feeling of those flames coming to warm her skin in a vain effort to feel like the sun. Something in her heart twists. It was. It was wonderful. She didn’t even care if it was because of how tipsy she was. To have someone so close, it felt amazing.

" _And I couldn't tell you enough that I'm sorry..."_

The lyrics repeat from the beginning, but they feel less hollow this time. More like it was Niffty saying the words, offering sympathy. Pity. Usually Helsa hates pity. Hates _being_ pitied. But from Niffty...?

" _Now when I'm face to face with Death, I'll ask him 'How does it hurt?' Up in those golden moments, growing old too quickly, was he thinkin'of her?"_

Death isn't a concept she knows personally. She understands it, understands she's killed plenty of people. She's been Death before. She understands the human conceptualization, the almost God-like status of the Grim Reaper. But these lines are... She feels tears break free from her eyes. Revenge, against death, for a loved one. And all she can think is how fragile a mortal like Niffty is in a place like this. Even as a demon, even with her powers and abilities and experience. She could die. The idea frightens her. It's the first time the concept of death has moved her in any emotional capacity.

She cries more, unsure why. 

The song echoes it’s chorus one final time, soft and slow, before the guitar and the voice finally fades. Helsa feels her cheeks slick with tears, and they just keep coming. They don’t stop, and, strangely, despite how scary they feel, how fearful the concept that brought those tears are, she can’t help but feel the urge to keep crying, and she doesn’t have the strength to force them back. Eventually, she stops. She can’t tell whether she does it on purpose or not, whether it’s because she doesn’t have anymore tears to shed or if she just wanted to stop before she starts hicupping. Why does the idea of Niffty dying hurt her so much? Why does it make her so damned emotional? She clears her throat and sits up, pulling her headphones off and stroking her hair back. The tendrils keep writhing, though they slow down as her hands course over them.

“Fuck.”

There was a soft ding from her phone. 

_-Did that help?_

The obvious answer is _no, it did not,_ but she can’t find it in her to say so, not in such blunt words. Perhaps because the answer isn’t so simple. She doesn’t feel any calmer, but in other senses she’s never felt better. Bittersweet. She types out a more neutral message. _It’s a nice song._

_-Yeah, I tend to use it whenever I’m in a bad mood. It’s pretty and calm and it helps me feel better. Glad to hear it helped you too. •)_

_Yeah, sure._ Helsa lets the message send, then quickly types out more. _Hey, do you want to meet somewhere? I’m kinda bored._

There was a slight pause. 

_-Right now?_

Good. Niffty asked that question. _Sure, why not?_

_Isn’t your brother going to catch you if you sneak out again? It’s only been, like, a week._

_I have methods to stop him, at least for a while._ Helsa glances over at some of her clothes. She had sewn some rough sigils into a few of them, an ancient tongue foreign to this realm. She isn’t really sure _where_ they come from. But it works to hide herself among the demons of Hell.

_-Ok, if you’re so sure. We can hang at my place if you want to. I have some snacks I can make if you’re hungry and movies we can watch._

Movies wouldn’t be too bad. Nothing too difficult in that. _Sounds fun. Where’s your place?_

_-It’s in the Southwest side. 283 Hickory Ave._

_Can you send me a pic? I can get there pretty quick, but it helps to have an image in mind._

_-One sec._

There was a slight pause that only lasted around a minute before the picture came through. It was quite the sizable house, one that appeared at least two stories tall, maybe even three, walls painted a vibrant navy blue hue with stained glass windows in swirls of all sorts of colors and a porch that had what looked to be a hammock in it as well as two chairs and a coffee table. The door to the house, painted a bright red, also displayed what looked to be a brass knocker in the shape of an eye.

Distinctive. Helsa saves the photo to her phone for later use and shifts off her bed. _Okay, I’ll be down there in a little bit. Give me a moment to get ready._

She glances over a rack holding a plethora of jackets and hoodies, then walks over and peruses the ones with fluffy collars. She wants something comfortable, not stiff or inflexible. There’s a hoodie with a fuzzy white ring around the edges, the fabric itself soft and plush. It’s longer than absolutely necessary, but that only makes it more snug. She plucks it off its hanger and slips it on over her tank top. It’s been over a day since she was last outside.

The phone vibrates one more time. _Ok, gotcha._ |) 

She couldn’t help but smirk a touch of that, taking a moment to wipe the last few remnants of her tears that still clung to her cheeks. Somehow she felt a bit more..light than she normally was, like some heaviness bearing down on her chest had been lifted up and finally removed and allowing her to take a deep breath. It was...refreshing. Helsa takes a deep breath, closes her eyes, and feels the air shift around her. The temperature gets warmer, less humid, and her skin dries a little from it. She feels the puffiness of her eyes drift away as she wills it. And then the sounds, no longer silent, but dull and soft. The sounds of people walking, maybe a stroller or cart here and there. A little bit of laughter or soft conversation. She opens her eyes, finding herself on a rather pleasant looking sidewalk, in front of the house that Niffty had shown her. She sticks her hands in her hoodie pockets and approaches the door.

She takes a moment to push away the screen door that was in front of the regular door, probably to keep bugs from getting in, and she lifts her hand to the brass knocker, giving it a gentle poke to determine that it was in fact metal and she wasn’t about to grab onto a wet open eyeball. She finally grabs it when she feels nothing but cold brass under her hand and gives it a quick knock, the sound audibly echoing a touch through the porch, as well as the oaken wood of the door. There was silence for a moment, before came the sound of the locks on the other side opening up, and soon Niffty’s face appears as the door opens, blinking in surprise, before a stunned grin grows over her face. “Heh! Wow, you weren’t kidding. That _was_ quick.”

“Yeah, I have a few tricks up my sleeve.” Helsa grins, and it’s both softer and tireder than usual. She shrugs as if the motion could deflect from the fact. “Can I come in? I don’t want people to start staring or anything. I’ve had enough publicity this week.”

“Oh, yeah, of course. Come in.” She moves to stand aside, and as Helsa slips through the door, she’s greeted by the sight of what appears to be the living room of Niffty’s house. 

The ceiling was a bright white hue, with nary a crack or chip to be seen, and from it dangled what looked to be an overhead light covered in what looked to be another frame of stained glass, creating a slight kaleidoscope of various different colors to blanket the room, the light also equipped with thick fanblades that were idly spinning overhead. The floor was a thick plush carpeting, notably clean of any stains or blemishes, a dark magenta hue, and just next to the doorway was one of the windows that lead to the view of the outside porch, draped in soft dull green curtains, mildly see through, and just below the window was a solid black radiator. There were shelves that lined the wall, carrying what looked to be looked to be small trinkets, such as miniature pillows or books or even what looked to be framed photographs, and she could spot at least one or two larger paintings that were framed and hung on the wall, the wallpaper displaying a dark blue pattern that had an array of intricate swirls of color, lines with black outlines, sweeping through it like curling waves, as if someone decided to liquify and rainbow and dump it into the sea to watch the colors blossom. There were at least two smaller wooden tables, both carrying lamps and untouched jars of candles, lining both sides of a massive grey couch that was covered in fluffy looking pillows, a few of them having those fabric tassels hanging off the ends. Across from the couch was a large wooden cabinet that displayed both a large television as well as what looked to be a few gaming consoles contained within glass doors, the controllers sitting atop them, both of them turned off.

“Huh. Nice place you have here.” The door closes behind her as she looks around, slowly easing her shoulders from their hunched position. She can’t help but notice how _lived in_ the house is. No dust either. Every inch of the place is either well kept or well used. She shifts her arms a bit in her hoodie pockets, eyeing all the colors painting the room. “You have a lot of pillows.”

“Heh. I like making my own things sometimes to use to decorate the house. Gives it a bit of a flare, you know?” She moves to lock the door again as Helsa steps away from it, before moving to trot into another room, and judging from what Helsa can glimpse, it seems to be the kitchen. “Anything you want? I can make popcorn, I got some soda, and I think I even have a tub of ice cream in the freezer.”

Helsa follows her, a little hesitant, but she continues to look around. The kitchen has a bit more of a wood theme, but it’s full of colorful cooking utensils and bowls and fruits. She leans against the entrance to the room, watching Niffty. “Popcorn and soda sounds good.” It suddenly hits her that she hasn’t asked what movies Niffty has. “Any ideas on what to watch? I’m not super picky, honestly.”

“Hmm..” Niffty briefly moves to open up the fridge to pull out two cans of soda, setting them down on the counter before closing it, walking over to a cabinet and pulling it open (it appeared to be filled with snacks), rifling through it. “Hmmm...Well, i got comedies, horror movies, action movies...I’m kinda thinking horror? I dunno, some horror movies can be considered comedies, if they’re cheesy.”

Helsa chuckles a little. “Yeah, you’ve got a point. I could be up for a horror movie. I don’t mind blood, but I’m not particularly into slasher films. I want something that would actually try and scare me, you know?” She walks a little further into the room, leaning against the counter and fidgeting with the soda cans.

“Hmmm...I think I got just the thing then. Or rather, _things_.” She chuckles softly, before moving to pull out a packet of popcorn from a box, unwrapping it from it’s wrapper and placing it in the microwave. She taps in the number and as it starts to hum, she also moves to pull out a salt shaker, a stick of butter, and a measuring cup. “Do you like butter on your popcorn?”

“Oh, yeah, lots.” She straightens as Niffty starts readying the popcorn. “It’s kinda been a while since I’ve had popcorn, to be honest. One of the theaters I used to go to all the time closed down a while back. I guess I kinda stopped going to other places.”

“Oh yeah, a lot of theaters kinda went kaput, didn’t they?” She tilts her head at the thought, before she moves to cut up the stick of butter, taking care to unwrap it first, before plopping both halves into the measuring cup. The popcorn within the microwave began to start popping, and she leans forward to watch it. “I mean, I’m not complaining. Do you know how many times I walked into a theater, not sure if it was gonna show porn or not? The 80’s was absolute hell. They were _everywhere_.”

“Oh, _gods_.” She rolls her eyes, half laughing and half feeling a headache coming on. “It was a whole thing. I couldn’t tell if people were doing it to just fuck with other people or if someone was just playing a prank on all of us. I guess Valentino was doing a few things for publicity at the time too...” She tilts her head back, thinking about it. “Porn’s been everywhere since the 60s, though.”

“I’m well aware of that, trust me.” She sighs and shakes her head, rolling her eye. “It’s honestly so gross to just have it everywhere. I’m not gonna judge anyone or anything who’s into all of that but, _I_ don’t want to see it _all over the place_ , you know?” She watches as the popcorn swells to it’s full size and stops the microwave, moving to pull out a giant bowl as she plucks the bag by it’s corner and places it within it, waiting for it to stop visibly steaming.

“Eh. I grew up with it, almost. Nudity is kinda...” She shrugs. “Normal. But I understand it kinda freaks some people out or something.”

“Hmm..” She seems to purse her lips at that, as if she was pensively trying to think of something, and she places the measuring cup of butter into the microwave, starting it back up. “Well, I guess, to be fair, Earth has always kind of been a bit...squeamish about sex in general. I’m just one of those people that kinda...I dunno. If I want to see it, sure, if I don’t, it’s just annoying.” She shrugs softly, though her cheeks are a bit more flushed at the topic.

She hums in return. “I suppose I can get that. Sometimes nudity get boring. Clothes look nicer, anyways.” Helsa smirks a little as she notices Niffty blush. “You ever try wearing anything sexual? I mean, not just for sex or anything, but just to see yourself in it. It can be some pretty empowering stuff.”

Her cheeks instantly blush a bit harder, and she lets out a bit of a high-pitched giggle, looking away, shaking her head as her hands lift up in an almost placating fashion. “Oh, uh, eheh, n-no, no, I, I could never do that. I-I’d be too nervous. I, uh, I get embarrassed real easy.”

“Well, I could always help you pick some stuff out if you ever change your mind.” She grins lightly, picking up one of the soda cans and popping it open. “No pressure, though, obviously. I just like helping a girl out when they need it.”

Her cheeks only grow in it’s flush, and Niffty moves to clear her throat with a fist in front of her lips, nodding twice, flashing her another nervous grin. “R-Right. I..I, uh...I’ll keep that in mind. Definitely.” The microwave goes off, and she moves to take the melted butter out of it, setting it down on the counter as she moves to undo the popcorn bag, tipping it over to spill the popcorn into it.

Helsa holds back a chuckle, looking aside and taking a drink of her soda. “So you said you had an idea of what to watch?”

“Oh, uh, yeah.” She seems to lose some of her blush, lifting up the measuring cup to start pouring the melted butter onto the popcorn, steadily pouring it in a circle to ensure it got as deep as possible. “Three movies, actually, if you’re up to it. All of them very big on things like monsters and gore. Those ones usually aren’t so shitty as bootlegs because, well, demons play the part of monster really well.”

“Is that why they’re always better? I just thought people down here were horrible at acting. Or just horrible at keeping the good actors alive.” Now that she thinks about it, it makes sense. Demons being able to kill each other without worrying much about _actually_ dying definitely means the more bloody acts are rather accurate. “But, yeah, I’m down for a marathon.”

“Cool. I have got just the movies. Sadly bootlegged, obviously, but still. The Thing, The Ritual, and Annihilation. Heard of them?” She moves to sprinkle salt over the popcorn before giving the bowl a shake, careful to not let any kernels fall out.

“Ah...” Helsa thinks for a moment, her hair curling a little. “I think I’ve heard of The Thing.”

“Oooh, I hope so. Even as a bootleg, it’s still _really_ cool.” She chuckles a touch, moving to grab her own soda as she carries the popcorn bowl into the living room. “Come on. We’re burning daylight. Nightlight? I can never tell what time it is down here because that damn moon never moves.”

“Ah.” She follows her, sipping at her soda again. “It’s the evening, so I suppose the analogy would be daylight?” She chuckles a little, watching Niffty lug the massive bowl around.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” She places the bowl down, moving to pick up the TV remote as she hops up onto the couch, clicking a button as the screen flashes on. “Which one do you wanna watch first?”

“Hmm....” Helsa puts her hands into her hoodie, thinking, and then plops down next to Niffty as she realizes she should probably be sitting at this point. “How about Annihilation? Sounds like it’d be a lot of fun.”

“Oooh, nice. I haven’t seen that one yet, but from what people have said, it’s pretty good.” She quickly takes a handful of popcorn from the bowl as she starts to scroll through the TV’s streaming app to search for the movie. After a moment, she comes across what looks to be a rather comically done promo image, the words _Annihilation_ written in an old decrepit-looking font, an image of some three-eyed demon wearing their hair in a bun holding a gun, standing in front of an odd shimmering rainbow gleam just above it. She presses a button on the remote again, and the screen goes black as the movie loads.

Helsa snickers a little at the promo. It’s difficult to find shows that properly work in advertisement, and she can’t help but find the iridescence a little bit childish for a horror movie. It’ll be interesting seeing why it’s so prominent, though. She glances at Niffty after a flash of recognition. “Isn’t that actor in, like, a ton of different films these days? She was in the recreations of, uh, what was it? _Star Wars?_ ”

“Oh yeah. I think her name is, uh..” Niffty taps the edge of the remote against her chin for a moment. “Supernova? Yeah, Supernova. I’ve seen her everywhere. Star Wars, Alien, Friday the 13th, lots of supernatural movies. She ain’t a bad actor from what I’ve seen.”

“Yeah, she’s not all too bad from what I can tell.” She steals a few popcorn kernels from Niffty’s bowl. The television hums as the movie starts, the opening scene starting to roll. “I should warn you, I tend to talk a lot during movies.”

“Heheh. Trust me, I’m used to it; I don’t think I’ve ever heard Alastor actually stay quiet for more than five seconds in his life and a movie isn’t gonna stop him from talking.” She flashes a grin at that, taking her own handful of popcorn. “So please, talk away.”

“He watches movies?” Helsa raises a brow at that. “I’m fairly certain he’s yelled at TV screens for simply existing.”

“It was mostly me talking him into it in the 80’s and 90’s. Told him about all the grizzly horror movies coming out and how it had a lot of death and blood and that seemed to reel him in.” She chuckles a bit at that. “It was actually kinda really fun. He’d either crack jokes when someone dies, tell me of a story of when _he_ tried the same technique, or just go on a rant about how “blood doesn’t spray like that” or “that’s not how you properly stab a person.”

Helsa snickers and shakes her head at that. It sounds like something the man would do. “I usually just make fun of things. Silly decisions, that kinda thing. Like this music. They’re really trying hard, aren’t they?”

“Oh, yeah, definitely. Like, out of all the ways you could’ve depicted a meteor crashing into the Earth, it had to be with a soft guitar solo?” She tilts her head a touch at that. “I mean, it’s actually kind of a really good solo but I’m not sure how it fits with _this_ scenario, you know?”

“I feel like they’re trying to get the whole Oh, look, how sad thing going, but it’s really not working.” She grabs some more popcorn, settling into the couch a bit more as the movie gets going.

They watch silently as the movie goes on, as it depicts Supernova as the main character going into a quarantined area said to be infected with some strange foreign “shimmer”, along with several other characters, who Helsa comments are mostly meant to be nothing more then pigs prepared for slaughter. They watch as they fight back the strange mutated beasts that have been warped in this quarantine area, clearly shot in one of Hell’s forests, and though some of the bootleg parts pop in here and there (some of the acting is a bit funny and the effects are a bit weird if looked at closely), it’s still quite a bit entertaining. Niffty winces at the scene where a mutated bear-like beast rips off the jaw of one of the characters, and she hisses through her teeth. “Ooh. Oh, that...That’s actually a torn off jaw. They really ripped her jaw off. Ouch.”

“Whoa, really?” Helsa glances at Niffty for a split second before turning back to the screen. “I thought that shit about the industry letting their actors get killed on set and stuff was just a rumor. Wow. Definitely beats having special effects, though.”

“Oh yeah, I agree, just...Wow.” One of her hands drifts up to rub at her own jaw, still wincing a bit as the bear on the screen starts to attempt to maul Suoernova’s character. “I dunno if there’s some kind of contract the actors have to sign or something but I’m honestly not surprised if they _do_ kill their actors. And that is real, no doubt. Look.” She briefly picks up the remote and rewinds it a touch to pause at the sight of the ripped off jaw. “The skin of her cheeks is torn unevenly and you can see the way the jaw bone breaks off from the rest of the skull. That’s authentic.”

“Ooh.” Helsa winces a little. “Yeah, that isn’t anything like bubblegum.” She leans forward a little, squinting. “Looks like real pain on their face too. Glad I didn’t go into acting.” She laughs a little at that. “Maybe I could be a good movie critic, though.”

“Heheh. That..That actually could be a good idea. I could be a co-host or something.” She chuckles a touch, then moves to play the movie again. “Actually, speaking of criticism..These guys went into a _quarantine_ zone, right? To investigate and destroy the strange alien presence in this closed off area?” She glances at her. “..Why didn’t they wear hazmat suits or something? Like, they went in with guns and military outfits and that stuff, but if this thing is this mutating virus or something like that, why not give them supplies and suits that are _built_ to prevent contamination?”

Helsa pauses for a moment, then snorts and tosses her head back. “Wow, they’re all idiots. They’ve gone and infected themselves. How much do you wanna bet Supernova gets out of this thing alive or something? Meaning everyone on the quarantine free zone is open to infection as well?” She leans back and grabs more popcorn.

“5 Presidents, that’s for damn sure, _at least_ .” She shakes her head, goes quiet for a moment, and then immediately pauses the movie again. “No, no, hold on, I gotta rant about this for a second. Like, ok, it’d be one thing if it was just, you know, a virus. But this is some _alien_ stuff. This is a foreign, extra-terrestrial entity going and infecting and mutating everything around it by ripping apart DNA from it’s victims and scrambling them together. Why would you send them in with guns and military suits if you know this shit can impact DNA at a _molecular_ level?”

“Huh. Yeah, you’ve got a point. Humans can’t do anything to something like that with just weapons.” Helsa tilts her head. “I guess they could have brought them to protect themselves from the mutations? Like, you know, the bear and shit. But even then, if you _destroy_ the alien presence by using, say, _a bomb_ , you’re just going to spread the stuff all over. Maybe burning it or pouring acid over all the infected stuff may do it, but...” She shrugs. “Doesn’t look like they’re toting anything like that.”

“Nope, nothing like that at all. Just military outfits, a few guns, and _sleeping bags_ , like it’s just a fun night on the town.” She stares at the screen for a moment. “..Also I don’t get why they’re just wearing white tank tops under their military clothes. Like, yeah, you gotta wear stuff underneath but why _tank tops_? Why not t-shirts? Or even a sports bra?”

“Yeah, you’d think they’d consider either wearing long sleeves, jackets, or just completely saying _fuck it_ to the virus and stripping, but no.” She rolls her eyes. “Go with the lame ass outfit that doesn’t fit you but makes it obvious how much cleavage you have.”

“Guh.” She rolls her eye a touch, leaning back against the couch. “You’d never catch me wearing those. I’ll wear anything else _except_ tank tops.” She’s silent for a moment. “Well, tank tops or see through shirts. Those annoy the crap out of me.”

“Eh, I kinda get the see through shirts. They look good on some people.” Helsa shrugs again. “But on a practical level, tank tops do nothing unless it’s ungodly hot outside, and even then there are better alternatives.”

“Like staying inside, for one.” She chuckles a bit at that. “Personally, I tend to _make_ most of my clothes so I usually don’t have to deal with those kinds of problems. Even made this myself.” She pinches the fabric of the dress she’s wearing in example, the one with the design of the poodle on it.

“I think you mentioned something about that before.” Helsa glances down at the poodle design. It’s incredibly neat and well done. “How long have you been making clothes?”

“Hmmm..” She squints a touch. “I think since I’ve been dead? I knew how to sew and knit when I was alive, but I mostly spent my time in college. It’s when I got down here that I mostly stuck to making things since, well, doctors don’t exactly do too well down here. What with death not having much consequence and such.”

"I suppose that makes sense." Helsa has never seen a doctor or nurse before. Or, well, she's never seen one in action. She's read plenty of textbooks featuring their work, though. "I guess that also explains how you know so much about the realism and all. Aside from first hand experience." She smirks at her.

“Hey, I’ve never gone and _ripped_ off a demon’s jaw before. That was all Alastor. Swung his microphone at some guy like it was a baseball bat and _bam_! Off it went.” She chuckles a touch at that, smirking right back. “I do know where to push in a blade so the body is paralyzed though. And how to properly break a femur.”

"That could be useful." Against other denizens of Hell. Not so much someone like Helsa. "But, yeah, I just low-key get really pissed off with movies having everyone in ridiculous outfits. The least they could do is add in a little style, you know?"

“Oh yeah, definitely. If I ever made clothes for anyone in movies, it wouldn’t be any god damn tank-tops, that’s for sure.” She rolls her eye for a moment, frowning softly, before glancing over at her. “Hm...” She starts to grin a touch. “...Hey. Want me to make you an outfit?”

Helsa blinks. “What?” She looks her up and down, as if trying to unravel a secret. “Make me an outfit? Like what?”

“I dunno! That’s part of the fun! We can both figure out what you want the clothes to look like and then I can try and make it for you!” Her grin seems to grow a bit at that. “What do you think? Could be a cool way to pass the time. Especially since you can make it any way you want.”

“Hmm....” She leans her head back, still watching her, thinking. It would be interesting to get something custom made. Her hair curls a little as she considers the offer. “I dunno. Wouldn’t that take, like, ages? Not that I’m eager to leave, but, like.... y’know. Family.”

“Who says I have to make it all right now? If you really want, I can just take your measurements while you’re here and then we can discuss design and stuff through text after you leave.” She crosses her arms a bit, smirking. “Besides, it could be a good way to get back at your brother for dragging you home. He clearly didn’t like that I was hanging with you.”

Helsa smirks at that. “Oh, he was pissed. Not like _horribly_ pissed, but just, y’know, really annoyed that I socialize with ‘Overlord minions’ without being in the presence of the Overlord. Some ridiculous tradition related stuff. It’s hard to explain.” She waves a hand, chuckling again. “Hm. Getting back at him. He’d definitely be pissed if he can tell you made it.”

Her eye narrows and her grin grows even more mischievous. “What of it? What can he do about it if he _does_ find out? Kill me?” She chuckles, shaking her head, and somehow it’s got a tinge of something sinister beneath. “Something tells me he doesn’t have the guts to do that.”

Helsa squints at her, feeling a small chill at the almost threatening tone in her voice. “You really would square up against my brother?”

Her lips curl into a vicious little grin, showing off sharp little fangs. “I wouldn’t just sit there and _take_ it, that’s for sure. There’s also the fact that I work for one of the most powerful demons in Hell who not only lets me tug broken glass out of his neck but also sees me as a friend, damn near close to a _sister_ , his own words, not mine.” She reaches over to pop a popcorn kernel into her mouth, still grinning. “So yeah, I think I’m good.”

“Well, you’ve got some balls, I’ll tell you that.” She laughs and stares at her. Niffty is small, even sitting next to her. She’s also not even batted an eye at any of the little Eldritchian slip-ups Helsa’s had around her, all the minor body transformations and cultural tidbits she’s dropped. Something tells her Niffty _knows_ how dangerous she and her brother could be, but she simply isn’t scared of the consequences. Helsa crosses her arms. “Yeah, okay. Alright, let’s try this out. An outfit. I’m guessing you have a measuring tape or something, right?”

Her sadistic grin is instantly washed away by a bright, much more vibrant smile, and she moves to hop up from the couch, walking toward the stairs. “Yeah, of course. It’s up in my workroom. Come on. And feel free to get creative with requests; I have a lot of experience with this kinda thing, so I can pretty much make any kind of clothing style you want.”

“Yeah? How about multiple fabrics?” She stands up, taking a step to follow, then pauses to snatch up the bowl of popcorn and starts eating it as she walks to the stairs. “Do you have neons? Most places I’ve seen don’t.”

“Yeah, I _should_ have neon. Depends on what kind of fabric we’re going with here. What are we talking? Cotton? Wool? Leather? Linen? Nylon? Lace?” They head up the stairs to at least 4 more doors, with one door ending the right side of the hall closest to the stairs, all of them closed, with a silver knob meant to open them, the walls having the same swirling color patterns as the living room. The other end of the hall contained a staircase, one of a spiral nature, presumably heading up to the attic.

“Uh.... Hm.” Helsa stuffs more popcorn into her mouth to give herself time to think. Even if there is multiple fabrics used, she’d want a base layer. She glances at her current attire, a simple pair of black leggings and a fuzzy hoodie. She has plenty of nylon, plenty of soft fabrics... “Leather sounds pretty good, actually. Do you think Leather looks good on lace? I’ve never considered it before.”

Niffty moves toward one of the doors, opening it and dashing inside before answering. Helsa follows shortly after, though she barely walks a few steps in before stopping to gape at the workroom. There’s shelves upon shelves lining the walls with color coordinated rolls of fabric, yarn, spools of thread, everything. There are mannequins in various poses, some wearing half finished projects, others wearing finished articles. There’s a singular mannequin that acts like a pin cushion, needles of all shapes and sizes stabbed into it. There’s three desks, perhaps to take into account Niffty’s tendency toward multiple projects, and they each have a cubicle full of must use items for sewing. There’s a dye station in the back, and one of the walls is just _plastered_ with diagrams and designs and color palettes. A few pages of the designs scatter about on the desks and across the floor.

“Whoa.” Helsa quietly steps further into the room, eyes wide.

“Heheh..” Niffty lets out a slight giggle, flashing an almost embarrassed grin over her shoulder at that, even as she starts to quickly swipe up all the pages that litter the floor. “Sorry about the slight mess. I try and keep this place as tidy as possible but the papers rip through and then they fall when I’m not around to pick them up.“ She moves to set them down on a table, to which she spins on her heel with a grin. “So, you said _leather_ , right? Leather with lace?”

“Ah, yeah, I hadn’t thought of them together before, but I don’t wear either very often.” She walks over to the table and leans against it, eating a few of the last kernels. “Is it possible to put lace _on_ leather? Or is it too delicate for that?”

“Weeeell, it depends on _how_ you apply the lace..” She trails off a bit as she moves to pull open a drawer to shift through what seems to be sheets of blank paper before pulling one out as well as a (mechanical) pencil. “Usually the leather is too rough of a fabric to really _sew_ anything into it besides the seams, but I _think_ I can find a way to make it work.” She sets the paper on a table and begins to write, the pencil scribbling for a few moments before it’s set down. She then darts over to another table and looks it over before picking up what looks to be rolled up measuring tape, grabbing one end of it and dragging it free from the roll, staring at it for a moment before nodding. She then looks back up at Helsa, then gestures to a chair. “Would you want to stand or sit for this?”

“I can stand. Make things easy for you.” She flashes a grin, straightening. Another idea comes to her. “Ooh, we could make lace sleeves. That sounds pretty neat. Like, the body is leather and then lace down the arms?” She sets the popcorn bowl aside and gestures to her figure as a method of description. “It’s, like, delicate and badass put into one.”

“Oooh..” Her eye seems to glance Helsa over for a moment, squinting, as if she was trying to envision it on her, before her own grin tugs up her lips, and she chuckles. “That sounds good to me! Love it, one second.” She moves to walk back over to the sheet, picking up the pencil before starting to scribble again. “Lace...sleeves...Leather..body. Got it. Anything else?”

“Well....” She crosses her arms. “I like color. Is it possible to get leather in bright colors? Like, really vibrant. I’ve seen dyed leather, but I’m kinda thinking brighter? I don’t mind fake leather if you have to use it.”

“Hmmm...” She squints again for a moment, tapping the edge of the eraser against her chin. “It might be possible, yeah.” She scribbles that last part in as well. “We can discuss that in more detail later if you want. Don’t be afraid to ask for new additions, I’m used to revising and revising until I get it right.”

“Yeah, sure. I’ve never really done a commission before, but I’ll try and get some thoughts in order for it.” She grins a bit softer, watching her jot down notes. “I’m getting the feeling sharks may end up on it.”

That gets Niffty to chuckle a touch, and she glances at her out of the corner of her eye. “Oh yeah? I’ll be sure to keep that in mind. Maybe I’ll make the collar of the outfit look like a circle of shark teeth.” She moves to grab the measuring tape again, before taking a step back, looking at Helsa through her fingers like she’s framing a photo, before walking closer, holding up the one end of the tape as high as she possibly can, craning up on her toes, only for the edge of the tape to stop just at Helsa’s chin. Her grin quickly falls, and she huffs, cheeks gaining a slight blush to it. “..Dammit.”

Helsa smirks, cocking a hand on her hip. “Want some help, sweetheart?”

Her blush grows a bit more. “...A little would be appreciated.”

She chuckles, taking the end of the tape and raising it up to the top of her head, straightening up again. “I imagine you get that a lot. People making fun of you for your height, that is. How long do they live after the fact?”

Niffty moves to slowly pull the rope of tape downwards, slowly pulling it toward her shoes. “It gets a bit annoying to constantly be called short, yeah. Especially in a place like this where half the people here are _over_ the regular height limit. I usually try to not let it get to me though. I’m a killer, yeah, but I’m not an _asshole_ ; I’m not gonna stab someone through the gut with my needle if they call me tiny. The retort isn’t worth the insult.” There was a slight pause as the tape hits the floor. “..6’1.”

“It’s weird thinking that humans are shorter than what I’ve seen here. Generally speaking.” She lowers the tape so Niffty can take it back without it snapping in her face. “Like, does that mean everything is differently sized on Earth? Are doors smaller? Are chairs smaller? Are paintings smaller on average because people’s arms aren’t as long?”

“Hmm..” She takes the tape and walks back over to the sheet to scribble down her height. “Well, I guess that kinda depends?” She turns to face her, crossing her arms as she leans back against the table in thought. “Like, usually things like doors are often built a good few inches _above_ the regular human height so no one goes bumping their heads on it when they walk from room to room. And a lot of paintings are still pretty big, from what I can tell, because artists tend to use ladders or other methods to paint their canvases. Chairs tend to have varying sizes, depending on if they’re meant for kids, but they mostly are meant to fit those of regular adult height.” She walks back over, with a bit of a grin this time, holding up the end of the tape measure again. “Ok, hold this. I’m gonna need you to hold out your arms as wide as you can.”

“Yeah, sure.” She takes the tape and spreads her arms. “I suppose that makes sense, but we do that down here too, right? Doors are taller than almost everyone just to make sure people aren’t hitting their heads.”

“Yup! Although..” She moves to lean up on her toes to squint at the tape before moving to scribble down on the sheet again, turning to face her with a grin. “There _is_ this fun little thing where in some places, there’s a bunch of _really_ old houses that still exist today. Think 1600’s, 1700’s, that thing. It turns out that when people today go to those places, they have to duck when they go in through the doors, because it turns out people back then were actually shorter than how people are now.”

Helsa frowns. “That’s... really strange. How did that happen?” She relaxes her arms as Niffty moves away. “What happened in, like, three hundred years to change people’s height?”

“Probably a lot of things. Life expectancies, medical science, the kind of food they ate, stuff like that. If people back then weren’t keeling over from tuberculosis or polio, then they either died from minor infections or not eating enough fruit.” She moves to grab the tape again, pausing a bit, before a slight blush comes back to her cheeks, glancing up at her. “I, uh..I’m gonna need to measure your waist size too. Just so you know.”

“What’s tubercu...” She frowns some more, starting to realize she didn’t know much about this part of Earth, and then blinks at Niffty’s subtle request. “Oh, yeah, that’s fine. Should I take off my sweater?”

“Yeah, that would be fine.” She clears her throat a bit, looking aside, but then glances back up. “Oh, uh, tuberculosis was a really nasty disease on Earth. Plagued a good chunk of human history for a long time. It’s basically this disease that infects the lungs and causes you to slowly cough up blood until you inevitably die from your lungs being too overwhelmed to work anymore. It used to kill, like, millions of people every year back in the 17 and 1800’s.”

Helsa pulls her sweater up over her head, brows raising as she hears the explanation. “Wow. Diseases aren’t very common down here, from what I understand. That must have been terrible, living through that.” She pulls her arms out of the sleeve and slides the sweater onto the desk, straightening the shirt she’s wearing under it, a simple pink dress shirt with green buttons. “Why didn’t it go into the 1900s?”

“Well, _technically_ it’s still around, but by the time the vaccine was made, the numbers of deaths that tuberculosis caused was decreased _dramatically_. Nowadays, from what I can guess, it’s much easier to treat and doesn’t have as nearly as much of a fatality rate as it used to.” She moves to press one end of the tape against her stomach, and begins to slowly walk her way around Helsa’s torso.

She holds her arms up to keep from messing with her measurement. “Oh, vaccines. I think I’ve heard of those before. They’re usually, uh, given through needles, right?”

“Yeah. They’re really an amazing creation of modern medicine, aren’t they?” She flashes a grin at that. “They’re basically, uh..” She pauses as she completes the circle, and squints toward the tape before carefully retracting it. “They’re basically small bits and pieces of really bad diseases, like smallpox or measles or the flu, but broken down so they can’t actually do anything to the body.” She moves to scribble down on the sheet. “Then they’re injected into the body via needles, and the body’s immune system naturally breaks down and fights against these dead bits to process them. That way, when the real disease gets into the body, the immune system is able to fight back and kill the disease before it can take hold and get you sick.”

Helsa squints at that, trying to imagine it. The images don’t quite match up or make sense to her. “So humans... inject themselves with disease in order to... prevent the disease getting to them worse?”

“Heheh!” Her laugh rings through the air like a bell and she gives her a bright grin, looking amused. “I know, I know. It sounds really backwards, I get it, but it actually works. Some diseases like smallpox and influenza, really nasty ones that used to kill millions of people, were practically _eliminated_ entirely by vaccines. No one gets sick from them now because the vaccines helped prepare the body to fight against it. It’s quite miraculous.”

She stares at her for a moment longer before it hits her. “ _Oh_! It’s like war logic. Let the enemy advance once to see how they work, so the next time they try anything, you can combat them more easily. Right. That makes sense. But it’s on a biological scale....” She purses her lips. “You humans are weird.”

Niffty can’t help but giggle again at that, shaking her head with amusement, before she moves to actually climb up onto the table, kneeling on it, holding the tape measure with both hands, her voice slightly mocking, teasing, with a slight giggle to her words. “Come here, _Empress of War_ , I still gotta measure your chest.”

“That eager, huh?” The response is immediate, as is the accompanying smirk, but she sticks with it, moving closer to the table for her. “Y’know, I kinda like that. Empress of War. Has a nice ring to it.”

Niffty’s cheeks once more light up in a blush, but she merely huffs a touch before smirking right back, eye narrowing a bit. “I can do a few other names. Queen, Lord, Sorceress, _Goddess_. To name a few.”

Helsa feels a small blush take over her face, a just barely noticeable hint of green dusting her cheeks. “Goddess, huh? That’s pretty high up there. I like Queen too. Not too sure about Sorceress.”

“Heh. I’ll be sure to workshop those names then. Now, shh. I need to concentrate.” She inches a touch closer, her face dropping the smile into a grimace of concentration, slowly pressing the free end of the tape right to Helsa’s chest, and Niffty’s blush gets a bit bigger, slowly starting to pull the roll of the tape under Helsa’s armpit, aiming to slide it around to her back. She bites her lip, forced to lean in a touch closer as her free hand moves to grab at the tape and keep it going, her eye practically inches away from Helsa’s chest, and her cheeks are practically crimson as the tape slowly slides around to the other side. She tightens the tape around Helsa’s chest, silently, feeling the back of her neck starting to burn.

Helsa shivers slightly as Niffty goes about maneuvering to measure her bust size, having to get rather close to reach around her. She can feel the warmth radiating from Niffty’s face and through her shirt, and her own blush heightens with it as she watches her work. Her arms, raised semi-awkwardly to aid in Niffty’s goal, shift a little, thoughtlessly drifting toward the little demon’s face, and she cups her chin, somewhat unsure of what to do next. Niffty’s eye snaps up to her and she feels something in her jump, half startled and half something else. She licks her lips, nerves starting to bite at her as she processes what she’s thinking. Her thumb brushes over the red circle on the corner of her mouth as she bends down to close the gap between them, slowly pressing their lips together.

The kiss felt..soft. Very soft, almost remarkably so, and for a moment it took Niffty a second to realize what was happening, but the moment it settled in, she couldn’t help but shiver, her eye slowly falling half-lidded. Helsa’s lips felt remarkably more cold then she thought they would feel like, not exactly freezing, and not exactly room temperature either, and it slowly tempted her to let her eye drift shut. She slowly leans a bit more into the kiss, just barely, accepting it fully, the tape going slack between her fingers. Helsa lets out a small gasp against her lips, recognizing the bit of pressure Niffty applies, and she slowly, carefully kisses her in return. She doesn’t know why she’s kissing her, other than she wants to, so she keeps kissing her, for no other reason than because she wants to. There’s something terrifying about it, terrifying about wanting it, and she can’t tell if it’s because she hasn’t thought it through, or because of some paranoia leaking into her thoughts, or perhaps related to her family’s reaction to figuring it out. She can’t remember anything her family had ever said on love and she can’t tell if it’s because they never said anything before or if its just the adrenaline making her thoughts jumbled.

She watches Niffty’s eye drift closed, the flush soft on her face, expression calm and relaxed dare she say euphoric. And she feels the incessant, nagging voices fall to the wayside. She seals the kiss more fully and presses against her lips a touch harder. Niffty feels the pressure being returned, feels the soft wetness of Helsa’s lipbalm practically sticking to her own lips, and something about the feeling has a small sliver of warmth trailing down her spine. The tape falls from her fingers entirely to hit the floor, and after a moment, her hands move to drift onto her shoulders, tentatively testing the waters, taking in the feeling of Helsa’s skin beneath the shirt she wore. Finally, she pulls her lips back slowly, feeling her body shiver at the sound of their kiss disconnecting, and when she opens her eye, she’s able to see the green glow of Helsa’s flushing cheeks, her beautiful emerald eyes, and she can’t help but feel herself grin ever so slightly. “Heh...That..That, uh..felt...really good.”

“Yeah, that, uh...” Helsa stares for a moment, entranced by Niffty’s gaze, the cute little grin on her face. “... _Wow_.” She laughs a little, unsure what else to say.

Niffty can’t help but chuckle too, ever so slightly, and she lifts a hand up to rub at one of her cheeks, swearing that her face was melting from how hot it felt. “You, uh..Ehem..You want to do it again, or..? I mean, it’s fine if you don’t, I just, uh..thought I’d ask.” She clears her throat, looking away, still flushing.

“I, um...” She swallows, watching the way Niffty’s blush returns in full force. She wants to kiss her again. “...I don’t know. I, um, do you? I mean, would you want to... you know?”

Niffty feels the heat slide down her spine and after a moment, she glances back up, cheeks still nice and rosy. “W-Well, um..I won’t say no to another kiss, if that’s what you’re asking.” Her eye seems to flick up and down Helsa’s figure for a moment. “Have you ever, uh..?”

“Oh, yeah, I’ve been with plenty of people in the past.” She clears her throat slightly. “I just mean, um...” Helsa takes a deep breath. “Look, I know you probably don’t know how I usually am with other people or online, but I can kinda be a bitch, and aside from that, my family is like, ridiculously powerful. _I’m_ ridiculously powerful. If we, y’know, do anything or put a label on any of this, I don’t want any of that being a reason for it. I want you to want it, so it’s not enough to not say no.” She rubs her thumb against her cheek, tilting her head against Niffty’s forehead. “So... what do you think?”

Niffty’s eye widens a bit as she speaks, and for a moment after the last question falls from her lips, there was nothing but silence. A small pause fills the air, Niffty’s lips turning down in an idle frown, her eye slowly filling with the barest flickers of conflict. Then, slowly, she leans back in to press a soft, sweet kiss to Helsa’s lips, pulling back just enough to whisper. “Honestly, I’ve never wanted anyone else before this. I mean, I always figured that I’d _find_ someone, someone that would just click with me right away like movies and everything always said it would be like, but, now that I know what wanting someone actually _feels_ like...It’s not what I was expecting, and I want it even more because of it.” A small smile fills her face, soft and sweet.

Helsa’s eyes widen slightly at the kiss, but she relaxes a moment later and returns the motion. She smiles softly in return. “Yeah, I... wasn’t quite expecting this either, heh.” Helsa looks down for a moment, dropping one of her hands to tangle with Niffty’s. “I... don’t think I really... realized I wanted to do that until I did it?”

“Heh..Yeah, I can imagine. How do you feel now?” Niffty glances back down at their hands, giving Helsa’s own a squeeze, before glancing back up at her.

“Um.” She thinks for a moment. “I... Kinda... scared?” She squeezes her hand in return, some of those voices she had managed to drown out returning.

“About what?” She frowns softly, looking concerned, her thumb gently rubbing the back of Helsa’s hand.

“I don’t know. It’s....” She takes a deep breath and exhales. “I don’t know. I guess this just feels more... real? And my family isn’t going to like hearing about this, but they’ll find out eventually. And we’re both kinda popular in our own ways, so eventually all of Hell will find out...”

“Hmm.” Her concern seems to seep into understanding, glancing back down toward their hands. “Well...Who says we have to figure out all of that right now?” She gazes back up at her with a soft grin. “I know it’s a scary thing to think about, but I know we can come up with something. And right now..” She slowly tugs their intertwined hands to her chest, squeezing Helsa’s own again. “Right now, we can just concentrate on being happy, you know?”

Some of the knots in her back loosen and she gives her an almost tired smile. “Yeah, that sounds pretty good right about now. Wanna get the rest of these measurements in and then, I dunno, have some ice cream or something?” Her smile widens to something closer to her usual. “I can snatch a tub without leaving the house thanks to my freaky Eldritch powers.”

“Heheheh. I was just about to suggest the same thing.” She moves to press a soft, chaste kiss to Helsa’s lips. “I don’t need the tape anymore. I got all I need.”

“Fast worker. I like that.” She smirks, lingering close to Niffty’s lips. “So. What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?”

“Chocolate, definitely. Chocolate chip cookie dough as a close second. Mint chocolate chip as a third.” She smirks right back. “You?”

“Mm, I think I’m a mint chocolate chip person myself, but I can’t pass up a good triple chocolate chunk.” She chuckles softly.

“Heheh. Sounds wonderful to me.” She chuckles right back, smirking still as she pulls away, moving to hop off the table. “Well, go ahead and work your magic, _Empress_.” Her eyelid lowers a bit, clearly teasing.

“Okay, okay. No need to rush.” Helsa smirks and stretches, cracking her fingers together and then holding them out in front of her, enough distance between her and Niffty to assure no mishaps of breaking the time space continuum would occur. A small, shimmering space appears under her hands and she dips her fingers into them, disappearing as she moves past the shimmer. She presses her lips together, feeling around in the different space for what she was searching for before managing to find it. “Aha!” She grips her bounty and pulls it up and out of the shimmer, a massive, industrial sized container of ice cream almost half the size of Niffty. “And there we are.”

Niffty watches the whole spectacle with a wide eye, her heart pounding ever so slightly in her chest, able to feel the way the magic bends and flows around Helsa’s hands as if she was merely dipping them below the surface of water, without even so much as blinking, while so many demons damn near tear themselves apart trying to perform such a massive feat. Her awe at the performance is only wiped away by the awe of the utterly _gigantic_ tub of ice cream she pulls from the ether, and Niffty feels her jaw drop, just as her grin widens. “...You’re already the best girlfriend I ever had.”

"Hah!" Helsa laughs, hugging the tub to her chest. "Hey, you're supplying the spoons. And the movie, if you want to finish it."

“Don’t have to tell me twice.” She already moves to dash out the room, practically running down the stairs. “Come on, we still got two other movies to watch!”

•••

Helsa jabs her thumb at her phone as she walks toward a more populated area of Hell. It’s getting warmer, which usually would be something to complain about, but someone decided to put together a whole plaza of festivities to keep Hell’s citizens happy. The fliers she had seen had said something about games, food, and performers, and as soon as Niffty had seen it, she had been bouncing about in excitement. Carnival festivities aren’t all too common in Hell, apparently, but Niffty had some fond memories from Earth regarding them. All Helsa knows is that the games could be cringey, but the food will almost always be good. It’s a good trade off, especially if it makes Niffty happy. She hits send on a message to Niffty, _Nearing the back entrance. Where are you?_

Her phone buzzes just a couple seconds later. _Near the food court, at the table with the purple umbrella on it._

Food court. Good place to start, in her books. Helsa tucks her phone away into a pocket of her jacket - the very same leather lace project Niffty had taken to not all that long ago - and walks into the crowd. Some people don’t seem to recognize her at first. She wants to say it’s the jacket, with its boisterous colors, all strips of pink, green, yellow, bright white, with stenciled red and black for highlights. On the back, there’s a shark howling and breathing fire at the moon, a boat and couple silhouetted in the moon’s light, while the front is more a patchwork of various different pieces of art, some fruits, some checkerboards, some clouds, some lightning bolts. There’s a few spots of white or purple or yellow lace on different colored backgrounds that spin themselves into spiderweb designs near the pockets and collar. Her arms, right up until her wrists, are multicolored lace, sometimes in blocks of color, sometimes blending or rainbowing together. Her hair is pulled back in a loose pony tail.

After a bit of walking, and having to claw a few people’s guts out for trying to touch her, she makes it to the food court. The mess on her hands vanishes and she looks about for the purple umbrella. It only takes a couple of seconds before she actually spots it, and when she does, the image of Niffty stands out amongst the crowd like a blazing flame, sitting there in a chair, already in possession of what looks to be a large soda in a plastic cup. She wasn’t alone either, and after a moment of idle shock, Helsa couldn’t help but feel her tendrils curl and shiver a little at the sight of him. She’s never actually seen the Radio Demon up close and personal before, and somehow she was and also _wasn’t_ expecting him to be so tall. He sat across from Niffty, lacking any kind of drink on his own person, looking to be happily chatting away with her, one of his ears ( _were_ those ears?) occasionally twitching atop his head, his oddly yellow fangs flashing in the light of the carnival attractions as he talked. The whole crowd was steering away from that very table like it was infested with some kind of plague.

Helsa narrows her eyes for a moment, trying to figure out if there’s some kind of trap laid out for her in this, but she dismisses the idea a moment later and starts walking toward the table. She needs to stop thinking like that. Not everything is a threat, and if she wants to hang around Niffty so much, she’ll have to extend that to one of the most deadly Overlords in Hell. She breaks through the crowd and approaches the table from Niffty’s side. She can tell the moment Alastor sees her because his mouth stops moving as smoothly and then suddenly and abruptly glows brighter. She can’t tell why his teeth do that. She doesn’t really want to know.

She nudges Niffty’s shoulder as she gets near and manuevers her way into the seat next to her. “Hey, losers.”

Niffty’s grin only seems to widen at the sound of her voice, and when she moves to sit down next to her, her arms wrap around Helsa’s shoulders in a tight hug. “Hehe! I was _wondering_ when you were gonna show up!” She leans back from the hug to look her over, eye glancing up and down over the clothes that she wore with a smirk. “Nice to see that you like my work so much. How does it feel? Anything odd? Too tight? Too snug?”

“No, it’s excellent.” She shows off her arms, flexing a little here and there. “I haven’t noticed any wear and tear yet, which I was kinda worried about. Maybe some cushioning on the insides or something, but nothing major.” She looks up to finally acknowledge the Radio Demon. “And you must be-”

“Alastor!” He sticks his hand out in greeting, grin close to splitting his face. “It’s a pleasure, _quite_ a pleasure! I’ve heard plenty about you from Niffty, my dear. All good, of course! Dare I say, if I heard bad, we wouldn’t be here!” He laughs obnoxiously.

“Uh. Right.” Helsa gingerly takes his hand, receiving a comical shake that almost makes her laugh at him.

Niffty herself giggles a little bit at that, giving her arm a slight poke with her elbow. “Don’t worry, he won’t bite. He’s actually a lot more goofy than you think he is. He only came here with me because he’s meeting up with someone else for the night.” She glances toward Alastor with a bit of a smirk. “I really hope you’re not gonna blow up the ferris wheel this time by the way. At least _try_ to keep it a little more mundane.”

“Oh, I ever!” Alastor pulls his hand back to his chest, and if Helsa didn’t know any better, he’d be making fun of the Boomer Pearl Clutching move. Chances are, he doesn’t know what pearl clutching even is. “I’d never ruin a day for you, my dear. Although, it _is_ rather fun to watch sinners run from a massive, metal hoop heading their way.” A devious look crosses his face, attached with some kind of nostalgia. “Oh, the screams were so lovely.”

Helsa glances between the two of them before raising a brow and leaning toward Niffty. “He can get _more_ goofy?”

He straightens, suddenly eager. “Do I need to start a musical number?”

Niffty snickers to herself, shaking her head. “No, Alastor, no musical numbers. I know Helsa, and chances are, she’s not gonna like being wrapped up in whatever weird hellscape you like to turn everything into when you break out into song. She _definitely_ won’t like you messing with her clothes.”

“Oh, yeah, no messing with my clothes.” Helsa raises her brow at that, but nods anyways. Sounds like some kind of specialized spacial manipulation technique. Makes sense with what she’s heard of the guy. But why use it for such silly things? Maybe that’s what Niffty was trying to point out to her.

“Fine, fine. No spectacular performances. Absolutely no love for them these days.”

Helsa squints at him. “Wait.” She glances at Niffty. “You said he’s here to meet with someone else for the night?” She looks back at him. “Who?”

Niffty’s snicker grows a bit more pronounced, her grin growing bigger as she looks back towards him. “Can I tell her?”

“Hmm....” Alastor narrows his eyes on her, then shrugs and summons a glass of licorice soda with the wave of his hand. Some unseen force pops the cap for him. “Sure! It’ll be out in public soon anyways. Might as well embrace it while I can.”

“Blegh.” She sticks her tongue out in visible disgust. “I can never understand how you can drink that stuff.” She then glances toward Helsa, giggling a bit. “Ok, ok, here’s the thing.” She gestures for Helsa to lean her head down, and when she does, she leans up to whisper, a hand cupped over her mouth.

Helsa’s eyes widen a touch the more she hears. “You’re kidding me.” She points at Alastor. “You and...? Really? Do you two hate each other?”

“Oh, he is _such_ a wonderful actor.” He props an elbow on the table and leans his chin on his palm, humming pleasantly. “You know, he purposefully missed me to hit that building. Just to let me hear the screams and revel in the destruction. Lovely man.”

“Hehehe. They’ve been dating for about 5 to 6 years at this point. You should see them on date nights.” She glances toward Alastor at that. “You practically have hearts dancing over your head. It’s hilarious.”

“Oh, please. The only person with hearts over their head is Valentino in that silly fur coat.” He rolls his eyes, leaning back and taking a sip of his soda.

“You literally look lovestruck. It’s...” She can’t believe she’s about to say it. “...almost kinda cute, honestly.”

He half chokes on his licorice juice. “ _I_ am not cute.”

“Yeah, you aren’t.” She crosses her arms, staring at him. “Which is why it’s so weird.”

Niffty chuckles a bit harder, chortling almost, taking visible delight in the banter, before she moves to take a sip of her soda, only to blink. “Oop. It’s almost empty.” She hops down from her seat with the soda in hand. “Hold on a sec, I’m gonna get a refill.”

Helsa raises a brow. “Do they even give out refills?”

“Does it look like they’re gonna say no?” She flashes a wicked little grin before moving off into the crowd.

Helsa watches her disappear, then turns back to Alastor when she can’t see her anymore. The look he’s giving her isn’t quite as amicable as before, something more calculating and stern to his gaze. His eyes narrow on her and he leans toward her. She straightens in her seat, almost scowling back at him. There’s a short moment where neither of them say anything, and then Alastor’s talons trill against the table between them.

“I’m only telling you this once, so listen closely, hm?” He tilts his head, static popping through his voice. Small visual distortions appear around his shoulders, then around his head, as if the air around him is starting to glitch. “If I hear that you hurt her or used her to your own advantages...” His eyes flash darker, dials spinning in place of his retinas. _“I will end you.”_

In an instant, it’s over, reality is sewn back together, and Alastor is all but humming as he continues sipping from his bottle. A small chill creeps over Helsa, recognizing a type of power rarely seen in demons. There’s more than simply spacial distortion to what he just did. Plenty more. She shakes her head and scowls at him. “You’ll be glad to know you won’t have to do any of that, then. This isn’t some kind of game to me.”

“Good to hear!” He grins widely at her and continues drinking.

Helsa couldn’t help but let a few of her tendrils wriggle slightly in place despite the ponytail she held them in, and she can’t help but stare at him, his posture completely snapping back into that jovial, almost goofy charm that it had been just a few seconds earlier. No wonder people were scared of this guy. He was practically a walking death trap, all smiles and quick wit and silver tongues until next thing you know, his teeth are buried in your throat. Though, while that little display certainly was threatening, it also pretty much confirmed, as far as she could tell, that Alastor truly wasn’t doing anything nefarious in terms of bringing any harm to Niffty herself. That causes the smallest of smirks to lift up her lips. “..Truth be told, she’s one of the best things that ever happened to me. I don’t intend to screw it up. So why don’t you calm down a bit, Gramps? You’re starting to sound like a parent with a shotgun.”

There’s a sound like a record scratch that comes from him, though he’s finished his swallow by the time the words finally hit him. He squints at her. “I... That’s not what I sound like at all!”

“Mhm. Sure. Keep telling yourself that.” She smirks a bit more at that, feeling a bit of a chuckle bubble up in her chest, though she squashes it down. 

There’s the sound of footsteps against the ground before Niffty hops back up onto her chair, though this time she carries two sodas in her hands, placing one in front of Helsa. “Here, I thought I’d get you one too. You said you like cherry soda, right?”

“Yeah, thanks.” Whatever tenseness remained in her system vanishes at the offer.

“Blegh. I don’t understand how people can stand that stuff.” Alastor makes a gagging sound.

“You don’t like cherry soda?” Helsa raises a brow at him.

“He doesn’t like _sweet_ things in general. Not soda, not iced coffee, not chocolate or candy. Not even _ice cream.”_ Niffty rolls her eye softly at that, shaking her head in exasperation.

“I like dark chocolate,” he offers. “And licorice.”

“That’s... not the strangest thing I’ve heard, but definitely a strange set of tastebuds.” Helsa sips at her soda, loudly.

There was a small buzz that fills in the air and both Niffty and Helsa instinctively reach to check their phones, only to look up and see that Alastor had in fact pulled out what looks to be a small black pager from his coat pocket, and was glancing it over with a bit of a squint, before moving to stand up from his table with a wide grin. “Well, ladies, I think it’s time to bid the both of you adieu for the evening. I do hope you two have fun.” There’s the sound of a slide whistle moving up and down as he mines lifting up a top hat off his head in farewell before turning on his heel and starting to walk away, a soft little tune playing from his microphone as he summons it into his hand. 

Niffty herself leans up a bit to wave, calling after him with a grin. “Remember what I said about ferris wheels! Try to not wreck the whole place!”

He waves a hand in dismissal, continuing to walk and hum as the crowd scatters before him. Helsa watches, brows raised, and slowly looks over at Niffty. “Did that man just pull a _pager_ out of his coat?”

Niffty starts to wheeze ever so slightly, her shoulders shaking as she laughs, nodding as she does so. “Y-Yeah. P-Pentious went and gave him one since he refused to learn how to use an actual phone.”

“Wow. He’s really as old fashioned as they say.” She shakes her head in disbelief and sips from her soda again. “Well, now that he’s gone to go commit crimes elsewhere, what do you say about getting this show on the road?” Helsa flashes a wide smile. “I hear there’s a ferris wheel.”

Niffty wheezes a touch harder, chortling to herself at that, giving her arm a playful shove. “Oh, shut up.” She moves to give her soda another sip. “I want to see if they have any good roller coasters around. Also don’t think for a _second_ that I’m not gonna try and win you one of those gigantic teddy bear plushies if we happen to see them. It would be a _stain_ on my title to not do so.”

“Oh really? You’ve got a title in places like this?” She nudges Niffty with her elbow, chuckling. “Winner of Giant Teddies, huh?”

“Heheh. _No.”_ She nudges her right back. “I meant my title as the Empress of War’s honorary firemage, silly. What kind of firemage would I be if I don’t present my Empress with a stuffed bear at a carnival?”

Helsa laughs louder at that. “Haha! Yeah, you may have a point there. It’s the custom for the Empress to walk away from every carnival with a stuffed animal, after all.”

 _“Exactly.”_ She gives her a grin before moving to hop off of her chair. “Of course, it goes without saying that if the game is rigged, which it very well could be, then I have no choice but to burn it into ash. After stealing the teddy bear, of course.”

“Oh, I definitely would never get in the way of such _professional_ work.” Helsa stands up after her. “It’s bad form to hold an official from performing their duties, after all.”

“Oh, now you’re just trying to flatter me.” Niffty chuckles a touch, moving around to her side, holding out her hand, a silent bid to take it if she wants to. “Ok, ok, do you _actually_ want to go ride the ferris wheel? I’m not gonna say no to something like that.”

“Hmm... I dunno. I’ve never really been on one before.” She takes her hand as they start walking back to the crowds. “I’ve never been to a carnival before.”

“Really?” She glances up at that, looking shocked, but after a moment, she flashes a grin and squeezes her hand. “Well, don’t worry. I’d be more than glad to show you just how fun they can be.”

"Yeah, that'd be nice. And, hey?" Helsa smiles softly, coming to a stop, and bends down to peck Niffty on the cheek. "I love you. Thanks for doing this with me."

Niffty blinks at the unexpected kiss, feeling her cheeks flush, and after a moment, a grin forms on her face, and she moves to press a kiss right back, on her lips. “Heheh. Love you too.”


End file.
